Alive and Kicking
by Tozette
Summary: Xellos and Zelgadis. The inevitable Morning After, followed by an uncomfortable week. Combine with Lina Inverse and Mazoku politics to slowly drive Zelgadis crazy. Liberally sprinkle with eggplant. Serve alive and twitching. Yaoi.
1. The Morning After The Night Before

Disclaimer: The manga/anime series, "Slayers" and any and all characters or place names pertaining thereto are the sole property of the creator and associated persons. The author of this story does not claim or aspire to own any of these. Any thoughts or opinions expressed by the characters in this piece of fanwork do not necessarily reflect those of the author or of the creator of the original series.

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"I didn't _trick_ you into anything!" Xellos protested. His hair was frizzy from the fireball and his smile looked a little bit strained. It didn't come close to erasing the aura of smug satisfaction emanating from him.

Zelgadis pulled him closer, hand wrapped in the collar of his shirt under the cloak. "Then what _did_ you do to me," his voice was beyond a snarl, "since I don't remember ever having volunteered to come within _feet_ of you, to say nothing of _touching_ you, much less –" he couldn't say it.

Xellos found this propriety terribly amusing, if slightly absurd.

"Ah, but Zelgadis," Xellos felt compelled to point out, "you're touching me now!" He paused, head cocked, to watch the crimson flush of rage swallow yet more of Zelgadis's face. Or perhaps it was just embarrassment? There was only one way to find out. "And you certainly didn't protest _touching_ me last night," his grin narrowed and he opened his eyes a slit, "_much_ less…" he trailed off, lifting one shoulder in a careless shrug.

Zelgadis punched him. It was a good punch. Zelgadis's fist was golem-strong and demon-fast, and he'd had plenty of practice. He knew how to get his shoulder behind the blow.

Xellos crashed into the wall and slumped against it in a steaming pile of Mazoku goo. Then he bounced back, almost like he was elastic. Zelgadis growled. Xellos breathed deeply of the wonderful aroma of rage and humiliation.

"Maa… well," he turned away, purple hair swinging around his neck, and tugged on one of his gloves, the only clothing he hadn't managed to return to his body before Zelgadis awoke. "You'll just have to deal with it," he turned his head to offer Zelgadis a glimpse of an eye and the edge of his sharp smile.

He picked up the other glove from the torn and disarrayed bed sheets. Stepping closer, well into Zelgadis's personal space, he reached over the other man's shoulder to retrieve his staff while he was still surprised by the movement. "At least until you remember for yourself, ne?"

The shocked look on Zelgadis's face faded, flashing to hot anger. He made a belated swipe to grab Xellos by the collar again, but the priest was gone, leaping through the astral plane to his next destination, and Zelgadis's hand met with nothing but air.

Lina pounded on the door. "Zel!" She sounded angry, and he wondered if she'd been banging for some time and he had been too intent on his personal mortification to notice, or if someone else had managed to piss her off this early in the morning. It wasn't a particularly difficult task. "ZEL!"

"WHAT?" He snarled at the door, yanking it open without turning the handle. It came off its hinges.

Lina had one hand held high, ready to knock again. She _looked_ pissed. Whatever she saw on his face, however, was enough to stall her temper. "Na… Zel, is something wrong?" she cocked her head, playing with a lock of hair.

"Wrong?" he growled, tossing the broken door over his shoulder. It crashed into the floor in a pathetic heap of wooden splinters, and he wished it had had purple hair and an irritating smile. "Wrong? No, what would be _wrong_?" he asked.

Lina was the last person who needed to know about this. In fact, _nobody_ needed to know about this. At least he knew Xellos would keep his mouth shut.

Probably. Maybe. Actually, it was entirely possible that the – _creature_ – would tell them all about this just to be unpredictable. He reflected moodily on this quality as he stomped down the inn's stairs to the common room and demanded coffee of a frightened serving girl.

He wasn't sure where Xellos had gone, but it wasn't downstairs. In fact, that morning had been the first time any of them had seen hide or hair of him since the Valgarv fiasco. Frankly, Zelgadis had been sure that whatever evil Mazoku general had had him keeping an eye on them had gotten bored and they weren't going to see him ever again.

And to think, he'd actually bordered on lamenting that.

He couldn't help it if he was a creature of habit.

He slumped into a seat in the corner of the room and cut Amelia's cheerful greeting off halfway with a glower. Gourry was harder to deter, mostly because he didn't understand how close he was to losing a few limbs that morning. Zelgadis gritted his teeth and continued to glare a hole in the tabletop until Amelia, fearing for her comrade's life, distracted him with food.

This, naturally, caused a riot, because if Amelia was going to offer her food to _anybody_, it should be _Lina_. They were lucky the table was made of such stout, heavy wood. It certainly was taking a beating. Gourry's head was harder than low-grade diamond.

The swish of the serving girl's frilled pink skirt brushed his arm. "Ah, your coffee, Zelgadis-san," she said cheerfully.

"Aa," he mumbled, accepting the cup and taking a long gulp before he realised that _the serving girl didn't know his name_. He jerked his head upright.

Suddenly, he was face to face with Xellos's smiling visage. He was wearing a dress that was knee-length, pale pink, and had an ineffectual little apron attached to it. It was possibly intended to be cute. He looked absolutely at home in that outfit.

The dress he was wearing wasn't any different from the other serving girls'. He even looked like a girl. Kind of cute, really… Except that he was a man.

Probably.

Actually, he was an astral spirit. A demonic one. So he really shouldn't have been wearing clothes at all. They were probably just an extension of the physical form he created for himself… which meant that he was naked.

Zelgadis blushed.

Xellos sparkled as though he knew exactly what was going through Zelgadis's head. "Special brew!" he grinned.

Ah. That explained it.

Zelgadis hefted the table and slammed it into his face. Both priest and table crashed into the far wall, which creaked ominously. The table fell into two neat halves on either side of Xellos's body, revealing him in a smoking heap, legs akimbo, flashing pink, frilled panties.

Zelgadis knew without a doubt that that sight would be burned, forevermore, into his retinas.

The fighting ceased. Lina, one hand wielding a fork with reckless abandon, the other buried in Gourry's shirt, turned to stare. Gourry, wooden serving tray raised in hopeless self-defence, turned to stare.

Amelia jumped up from under the table to point at them. "Ah! Xellos!"

Yes. It certainly was.

Zelgadis saw the proprietor approaching. Resigned, he held up his hands in a gesture for peace and left the building.

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Well, it could be a stand-alone, or it could be a part of a larger scheme… maybe I'll keep writing and see if a relationship can be salvaged from this wreckage. I've never written Slayers fic before. It's fun. nn


	2. The Beginning

See first chapter for disclaimer.

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It was not terribly surprising that they'd been kicked out of the inn. It wasn't the first time, and it wouldn't be the last. They'd made their way to the village centre, a little square of paved land with a bubbling fountain and a raised platform. It was used for village meetings. Luckily, it was also used by lost travelers, since they were the only kind that ever made it to the village.

Lina, Gourry and Amelia were crowded around the large map in front of the fountain. Zelgadis was slumped on the lip of the fountain, glaring at the cobblestones so hard they shriveled slightly, and Xellos was picking his way along the same ledge.

While Zelgadis was still sunk deep in his awesome blue funk for some unknown reason – possibly just his regular angst, since she'd found that these things went in cycles with the chimera – Lina was trying to map out a path to a forgotten Ryuzoku temple. It was made slightly more difficult by the unfortunate fact that the temple didn't appear on the map, and that Gourry had mistaken their map for toilet paper.

Lina had never seen toilet paper with roads on it before, but she decided not to try to fathom Gourry's mind. It echoed in there.

Originally, she'd planned to make Zel do it, but failing that, she'd looked around and realized that unless they wanted to be wandering around, totally lost, for eons, she was their next best bet. Still…

"ARGH!!" she growled, tugging at her hair. "This thing doesn't match _anything_ that was on my map! It's gotta be upside down or something."

"Is it?" Amelia squinted. "I'm not so sure…" She turned her head sideways. "Some of it looks the same."

Lina stopped doing her little caper of frustration and peered at the map again where Amelia was pointing. "Hey, you're right," she said in a tone that had gone instantly normal. "That ridge looks familiar. And what about through here?" she drew her fingertip in a line along a road. "That's the one we came here on, isn't it?"

"I think so," Amelia agreed, "but just here, around this village, everything is totally different."

Lina sighed. "Well, which one's right?" she growled impatiently.

Amelia shrugged. "I don't know."

"Are you girls trying to find those ruins?" someone asked in a wavering voice behind them. Lina and Amelia turned to find a woman, so shrunken with age that she barely made it up to Lina's hips, bent over a walking stick and peering at them from behind Gourry's thigh. He looked down at her, blinking.

Lina bent to talk to her. "Ah, yeah. Do you know anything about it, 'bachan?" She asked. The woman was probably more a 'grandma' than an 'auntie', but Lina figured it didn't hurt to be polite. At least not when she wanted something.

"Oh, yes, I went there quite a bit in my day. That was before I met Joseph, of course… Now THERE was a fine man…" the woman continued on in this vein for quite some time.

Lina sweatdropped. "I… see." She said. "That's – that's great, 'bachan," she raised her voice over the old woman's. "What about the temple?" she pointed to the map. "Where is it?"

"Oh… around here, somewhere," the woman shuffled forwards and stood on tiptoe to touch the map. "Or was it here…?" she moved her hand. "I do have such a hard time remembering things like this…"

Lina ran her fingers through her hair. "Yeah, well… thanks for your help, 'bachan," she sighed.

Lina looked around. Gourry was scratching his head. Amelia was clearly determined to make sense of the map, mumbling to herself as she prodded it. Zelgadis was throttling Xellos, face red with anger or embarrassment. It was an interesting sight, briefly, as Xellos tripped and they both crashed to the cobblestones. Zelgadis didn't seem to notice much; he just went right on strangling.

She sighed. "Oh, who cares about the map," she growled. "We have a general direction! Let's just go!"

"Are you sure that's wise, Lina-san?" Xellos asked from where he was pinned, momentarily pausing in his attempt to free himself. His voice was not at all strained by Zelgadis's hands crushing his windpipe. The chimera resolved to try harder. Xellos's smile widened.

"Wise or not, it doesn't matter." Lina shrugged, folding her hands behind her neck and starting off without them, "We're not getting anywhere just sitting around here."

Gourry was a step behind her. "Right," he agreed. Amelia blinked away from the sign and followed, calling for them to wait for her.

Zelgadis, sensing that he was about to be left behind if he tried to kill Xellos for much longer, reluctantly removed his hands from around the Mazoku's neck and stood. That was his intention, at least, but he only made it half way before Xellos's hand closed on his wrist like a vice.

Xellos hadn't even tried to rise to his feet. His hair was splashed across the stones. He was smiling, eyes closed, like he was enjoying the cold light from the overcast sky, but his grip was strong. Zelgadis realised that they were no longer surrounded by the group. He licked his lips and tried to rise fully. Inertia made him crash back down to the ground when Xellos simply refused to move.

It took less than a shocked second for Zelgadis to find himself on his backside with Xellos crouching over him.

"See?" he grinned sweetly. Zelgadis didn't see. He must have projected as much, because Xellos's smile widened. "I can be the immovable object, too." He caught Zelgadis's chin in his hand and planted a firm kiss on his forehead.

Zelgadis tried for disgust, and when that didn't bubble up in his gut, he tried for scorn instead, tilting his head back to stare at the Mazoku. "What," he ground out, "do you want?"

"What if I just want you?" He was teasing him.

"You don't." Zelgadis said.

"You're so certain." His voice had an edge to it.

Scorn faded. Exasperated irritation followed on its heels. He bent a few strands of steel hair out of his eyes. They stuck out. Xellos's eyebrows rose. "Cut it out. What are you doing here again? What do you really want?" He could ignore that Xellos was so very close if he tried; at least they only had that one point of contact; the glove wrapped around his wrist was hotter than human skin.

A flash of memory, like seeing someone through thick fog and drizzle, occurred to him. He knew how much warmer Xellos's skin was. He knew how moonlight was tentative to linger and left strange highlights. He grasped for further memories from the previous night, but couldn't find anything. It wasn't the hazy recollections of being drunk, he knew that much, and the headache he had didn't feel like a hangover, but those memories were missing.

Xellos had allowed him his reverie without interruption. He wondered why. The priest cocked his head, cute smile firmly in place. "Don't you know better than to ask that yet?"

What had he asked? Oh, right. "Humour me," he growled.

Instead, Xellos let his eyes slide open. "Zelgadis," he said. He'd dropped the honorific, and Zelgadis wasn't sure why. He didn't like being unsure about things. Perhaps it was why he disliked Xellos. "Do you remember anything from last night?" the question was phrased very carefully.

In the time they'd traveled together, Zelgadis wasn't sure he'd ever heard Xellos ask for information. "You don't remember, do you?" he whispered.

Xellos didn't answer him, but he didn't move either. He was stone-still, a stillness that humans didn't have. Humans shifted, breathed; at the very least they shook with maintaining a single position so very still. Zelgadis licked his lips. "You don't, do you?" he was certain now.

That wasn't some stupid Mazoku trick to bed him. That was a different thing altogether. Mazoku were astral spirits that thrived on negative emotions. Some plants with specific properties might alter their memories, but not something as powerful as Xellos, and even then, there was no reason to suspect that the same compound would affect Zelgadis in that way.

A creature powerful enough to mess with _Xellos's_ mind… Suddenly he didn't feel like it was midmorning in the centre of a populated village anymore. They were very, very alone. The bleak pall surrounding them made him cold to his core. In the midst of the trembling line of energy between them, Xellos's burning grip was a connection, a single point of heat.

He jerked away, using his own strength to its limit, and was surprised when Xellos gave him back his arm easily. The spell was broken, they moved freely.

"Don't try to intimidate me into answering you," Zelgadis growled, stepping back.

Xellos's eyes were open wide, glowing violet as he scanned the area. He was on his feet, staff scooped up in one ready hand. People passing glanced at them and quickly turned away. The square cleared in tense seconds.

Zelgadis had finely honed instincts and an incredible pessimism. He thus knew what Xellos's next words would be before he spoke, but the slow, dangerous tone in his smooth voice was unexpected.

"That wasn't me."

The energy rolling from Xellos was much like black magic, but with that subtle difference that said that it was an integral part of the consciousness directing it. It was that grey area between summoning magic and owning it. It sizzled along his nerves, like being too close to a sorcerer casting a dragon slave – or, in fact, being too close to an angry Mazoku.

It disturbed him that the energy was familiar, and in its own way quite comforting. The devil he knew, perhaps. He could analyse that to death later. They had an enemy here somewhere, even if he couldn't see it.

By mutual consent, they edged around until they were almost back-to-back. "Come out, come out," Xellos chirped. The sweet tone was laced with Mazoku-power. It came out mocking and derisive.

From the very stones of the village came a thin black liquid, swarming to the fountain. Zelgadis followed it with his eyes. "What is that?" he muttered. It looked like squid ink. He was betting it was something much worse.

"Don't let it touch your skin." That wasn't really an answer, but it told Zelgadis all he needed to know.

The fountain's water went black at the first drop. It spread like dye in little trails, and then suddenly the water was no longer water. "Xellos… do you know what this is?" he asked again, drawing his sword. He didn't think it would be helpful against water, but it made him feel better.

"Maa… sort of," Xellos seemed more relaxed now. Then again, he'd looked just as relaxed when Garv had been trying to rip holes in him. Zelgadis didn't lower his sword. "I hadn't thought to see this power again," he mused to himself.

Zelgadis didn't bother asking again exactly what it was. "Fine. How do we kill it?"

Xellos didn't answer. "You can do better than that," he called sweetly to the swirling black mass in the fountain.

With an angry crackle of power, it surged upwards to take shape. She looked almost exactly like a water spirit, young and lithe and clothed in seaweed that certainly hadn't come from the fountain, except that her skin was black and her eyes were a strange, shifting blue.

"I thought so," Xellos said softly. "But what could Kai-ou want with us?" he cocked his head at the other Mazoku, "unless, of course, she's simply lashing out at someone in her insanity." His smile was sharp-edged. "What's it like, serving someone completely insane?"

The Mazoku in the fountain spread her lips in a snarl, flashing long white teeth. What came from her mouth was nothing more than a gurgle.

"She can't talk?" Zelgadis asked.

"It would appear not," Xellos agreed. "If you don't mind, Zelgadis-san, I will take this one." He flexed his fingers in a manner ominously reminiscent of talons. The hiss of energy as he disappeared raced along Zelgadis's skin.

The other Mazoku also disappeared to the astral plane. Zelgadis debated catching up to the group – he could hear in the distance the sound of one of Lina's spells blasting Gourry, along with the redhead's barely-coherent shrieks – but Xellos would be returning to where he'd last been on the physical plane before he took off again, and Zelgadis wanted some answers.

Slouching atop the rim of the empty fountain, he considered that Xellos wasn't really the best source of answers around. In fact, the best response he could hope for was to be told it was a secret – at least that way the irritating Mazoku would be acknowledging that he'd asked a question!

He allowed himself to become absorbed in his thoughts of irritation, anger and faint traces of fear. Fear was almost omnipresent for Zelgadis; fear that there was another attack coming, fear that he wouldn't be strong enough, fear of rejection, fear that he would never find a cure, fear that he would find a cure – take your pick. He was often afraid, but he knew how to control fear. Anger and irritation were the real problems.

"Not that I don't appreciate the snack, but –" There were hands on his shoulders and a voice purring into his ear. Zelgadis missed the rest of the comment in the following fireball and resulting crash.

Xellos's eyes were little swirls. "I…tai…" he smoked.

Zelgadis didn't respond to that. "You killed her?"

Xellos reappeared, reclining against the fountain. "Of course I did," he said. "My, my, Zelgadis-san, what do you think I am?"

"Save it," Zelgadis sighed. "Tell me what's going on."

Xellos lifted an eyebrow. "Later, Zelgadis-san," he held up one hand, staff suddenly appearing in his other. "That threat has been dealt with," his lips curved at that, and Zelgadis fought off a shudder with a disdainful snort, "and we should catch up with Lina-san."

Later, Zelgadis thought, might be too late. Especially considering the apparent abilities of whatever creature was out to get them this time. But he wasn't getting any answers here. He nodded sharply, and started off in the direction Lina, Amelia and Gourry had gone in previously. He didn't look behind him to check if Xellos was following.

If he had, it would only have caused more delays, because the Mazoku priest was tilting his head, speculatively watching Zelgadis walk.

But as lovely as the chimera's backside indubitably was, he needed to report to the Beastmaster on these developments. He was sure she would find the entire situation interesting.

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My first Slayers fic! Yay! Say it with my, guys – "YAY! GO YASI!"

Or not. Whatever. So, yeah… I respond to reviews! Most of them, anyway. Tell me stuff. About the characterization, or lack thereof, about autocorrect changing half of my spellings to their US equivalents and leaving the other half, or just about what you don't like/like, where you think the plot's going…

Oh, also… do we like yuri? nn


	3. The Plant

See first chapter for disclaimer.

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Zelgadis caught up with Lina just as she was loudly complaining about his tendency to disappear on them. The clearing she'd picked to whine in was a good one; large enough that ambushers would have a hard time sneaking up on them and far enough into the forest that nobody would hear those same ambushers' cries of alarm when Lina used them for stress relief.

The famed Sorcery Genius herself was warming up to a really fine rage when Zelgadis found them. He interrupted her violent admonitions to fill the group in on the details of the Mazoku that had confronted them, including Xellos's remarks.

"So," he finished while Lina was frowning into the distance, "I theorise that the Mazoku was one of Deep-Sea's servants." They'd learnt, through trail and error, that it was best to know which dark lord they were dealing with before they made any plans to counterattack.

"Sounds like it," Lina agreed darkly, "but I thought all of her servants died?"

"They did?" Amelia blinked at the same time as Gourry said, "I don't understand the details, but that's bad, right?"

Lina felt a heavy bead of sweat roll down her head. "Yes, Gourry, this is bad," she sighed. "The Kai-ou, Deep-Sea Dolphin, is one of the Five, like Garv and Phibrizzo," she said. "She's supposed to live somewhere in the Demon Sea, but she lost all of her servants in the War of the Monsters' Fall."

Gourry was nodding along. "Ah, I see."

"…Really?" Lina asked, raising her eyebrows.

"Hey, Lina… That means… that means…"

Lina waited. If Gourry was about to say something intelligent, she didn't want to miss it while she was beating him.

"That means she's really old, too, isn't she? Like Xellos, I mean."

Lina rubbed her head and turned back to Zelgadis. "Yes, Gourry, very old," she sighed, waving one hand at him. "Anything else you can tell us?"

Zelgadis hesitated. He glanced at Amelia and wondered if he should tell them what happened between himself and Xellos the night previous, but… well, firstly, he wasn't sure if Dolphin's objective was their group or Xellos personally, and secondly, he didn't really _remember_ what happened last night. He'd woken like struggling from unconsciousness, naked and next to Xellos, who had almost been catatonic – he certainly hadn't woken up before the first punch had connected, anyway, and Zelgadis was pretty sure that Mazoku didn't need to sleep…

He shook himself out of his reverie and shrugged. "It's possible that she could be aiming for Xellos, and not us," he said, because he had to say something. Lina was giving him suspicious yes. "Xellos and I were together at the time," he added.

And wasn't that the truth.

He hoped this plot, whatever it was, was directed towards Xellos. If it wasn't, he'd have to sit down and tell Lina…

Inwardly, Zelgadis cringed. He could see that beating coming a mile away.

"Why…" Amelia frowned, "Why do we know it's Dolphin?" she asked. "I mean, it's obviously not the Beastmaster, because it attacked Xellos-san, but isn't there another Mazoku Lord? And even the possibility of solitary Mazoku?"

Lina nodded, "Yeah, there's another one. Ha-ou," she said. "Dynast." There was silence. "Some of what Xellos said about being insane could pretty much only refer to Dolphin," she explained, "But I suppose I'm kind of hoping it is Dolphin. There's no really good option here," she sighed, "but Dynast is definitely the worst."

It was the popularly-held opinion among those who practiced black magic that Dynast was the coldest and most ruthless of the Mazoku Lords, but Zelgadis had to wonder. Was insane better than ruthless, or worse?

"Ah, there's nothing we can do about it!" Lina decided, springing back with reckless energy, "Let's find this temple, get this enchanted whatever, and then get some food!"

"Yeah!"

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"Juu-ou-sama," Xellos knelt, head bowed towards the throne.

"We're alone, Xellos. You can dispense with the formalities," Xellas's voice was a throaty, contralto purr. "Come here and tell me what unsettled you so much you felt you _had_ to report in person."

"Yes, Xellas-sama," he responded, rose and approached her throne. Even as close as he was, the shadows clung to her figure. He could see her glowing, purple eyes, one bangle-strewn forearm and the tips of her tanned toes. Although that was enough to tell she was in human form, the rest of her was obscured.

Xellos glanced around, "I like what you've done with the reception area."

"Oh?" she flicked the ash from her cigarette with dexterous, delicate fingers. "The phosphorous was boring me. So last millennium, don't you think?"

"What makes the lava pits glow?" Xellos asked curiously.

Xellas shrugged. "Some of the animals in there used to glow. Now, what's this problem?"

He bowed his head and began to recite. "I encountered a Mazoku who most definitely had the sort of power Kai-ou can bestow," he explained. "I had to kill her, but it does seem a strange coincidence, given –"

"Given what you've already told me about the chimera," Xellas waved that off, "Yes," she paused, "but that doesn't seem like Dolphin's style at all, and she is permanently insane, is she not? You are the only one who has seen my spell's ultimate effects."

Xellos spread his hands. "It seemed that way, Xellas-sama. However, it is possible that another Mazoku of some power…" he trailed off.

"Dynast," she growled, and her voice carried menace that rubbed along the skin like fur.

"There are others," Xellos said carefully, feeling sweat bead on his skin at the crushing energy she expelled. "None so powerful, of course, but…"

The Beastmaster turned her head away. "True. Any Greater Mazoku would be able to lift the edges of that spell. A direct attack is too clumsy for the amount of control Dynast would have over her," she paused, "but he knows me well. It's possible he's predicted this line of thought."

"We shall see," she purred after a moment, standing and swiftly crushing her cigarette underfoot. Her lips curved into a narrow smile of pure, malicious joy.

"What do you want me to do for the moment, Xellas-sama?"

She waved a negligent hand, "Keep following them. Lina Inverse tends to have her hand on the pulse of our existence, whether or not she knows it. In addition, report to me once weekly, in person."

"Xellas-sama?" he blinked. She turned to him, beautiful when the light dared to touch her, with long tangles of blonde hair and firm dark skin. Her face was striking with high cheekbones and sharp angles.

"I don't want to lose you, Xellos," her voice softened briefly, but turned sharp as she clenched her jaw and turned away again "I don't have many servants left to lose, and you have been… useful, to me."

He lowered his head to hide his smile. "Of course, Xellas-sama."

"Stop that," she growled, waving him off. "And go back to work, minion."

"Yes, Xellas-sama." He was gone in a shiver of power, and Xellas sighed.

"You really should be honest with yourself," another voice intruded on her purposeless staring into the lava pits. "It's _okay_ to like your servants."

"Oh, who asked you?" she snapped, slapping at Luna's hand as it wrapped around her waist.

Luna shrugged. "Just some friendly advice. Want a drink?"

"Mmmm," the Beastmaster purred. She closed her magnificent eyes and leaned into the touch as Luna's hand crept further up her waist, "Can't you think of something better to do?"

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The Ryuzoku temple wasn't easy to find, but their little group had perseverance, determination and a lot of practice at finding things that other people did not want found.

It had once been a building with white marble columns and delicate archways, but now the marble was cracked and broken and vines swarmed up the columns and swallowed all but the faintest flashes of white in the arches.

As Amelia peered under an archway, one of the dangling vines snatched at her and caught her around the waist. A moment later, what looked like the oversized, mutated head of a Venus flytrap snapped at her face.

"EEK!" Lina, Zelgadis and Gourry span at the sound.

"Flare --!" Zelgadis ran forward, magic gathering in his hand.

"Fire --!" Lina took a deep breath and held her hand aloft as fire gathered in her palm.

"Light --!" In a move so classic it didn't require reanimation throughout the entire series, Gourry unsheathed his sword.

Amelia's face went white at the sight of the magic coming her way. The vines surrounding her unwrapped themselves and wisely fled, but Amelia herself was not quite as lucky.

The resulting explosion was extraordinary. Amelia slumped to the ground, smoking, and coughed. "I…tai…" she managed.

"Amelia!" Lina ran to her, "Are you okay?"

Zelgadis touched his temples and sighed. "Ridiculous," he muttered, but proceeded into the temple with his sword unsheathed.

That was a good thing, because forgotten temples with mutant carnivorous plants were an excellent nesting ground for trolls. He stopped when he saw them. "Lina," he called over his shoulder.

"What? Can't you see I'm busy here?" she snapped back from where she was healing Amelia. The young shaman had tears streaming down her face, steaming at contact with her smudged skin. Some days, Zelgadis was glad he didn't burn easily.

"Trolls."

"Again?"

"So it would seem."

There was the sound of clattering footsteps, and then Lina was at his shoulder, looking at the slavering mass of jewel-bright humanoids. "Trolls," she sighed. "Jeez, this had better be some enchanted thingy."

Zelgadis grunted his agreement. "Do you know any divining spells that will help us find it?"

"Do I look like a priestess?" Lina replied. "Amelia will be able to find it," she said confidently, "after all, what else is a shrine maiden for?" Zelgadis didn't answer that.

"Hey, trolls. Look, Amelia. Trolls," Gourry strolled into their room of the temple. "Lots of them."

"Again?" Amelia whined, appearing at the entrance with a cross-shaped band aid on her forehead.

"We've had lots of trolls before?" Gourry scratched the back of his neck. "That's funny, I don't remember… but now that you mention it, I guess we have!"

Lina groaned. Zelgadis raised his sword. "Astral vine," he muttered half-heartedly. "Shall we begin?"

"We're not getting any younger," she agreed, and they were off.

The trolls who had inexplicably but obligingly waited for them to conduct their comic relief before attacking, charged them with a roar. Lina readied a spell that would turn their healing power back on them, and Gourry followed with his sword. Amelia was pummeling them with the Fists of Justice, and she seemed to be doing okay, so Zelgadis set about the work of killing his share.

For trolls, cutting off the head was the best sure-kill method, but Zelgadis's enchanted sword slowed their healing ability, so they became much easier to deal with. In minutes, the room was cleared, and Lina was dusting her hands.

"I feel better now," she declared. "Now, Amelia – find our artifact!"

"What? ME?"

"As a shrine maiden of Seyrunn, I know you can do it!" Lina clapped her on the back. Gourry nodded encouragingly from behind her.

Amelia looked between them, "Ah… I can try, I guess…" she agreed, and settled down to attempt her divining.

Zelgadis shook the troll blood from his sword and peered into the next chamber. Here the floors were also covered with sprawling vines. Occasionally, they slithered and hissed. Squinting, he could see that some of them were snakes and others were actually the vines. Maybe fireballing the whole mess would be the best way to continue, but it was also possible that the shock would bring the cracked roof down on their heads.

"Ah, Zelgadis-san, can you stop moving around? You're very… distracting."

"Huh?"

"You're the most enchanted thing in here, stone-boy," Lina tossed her hair, "so stop messing with Amelia's spell already!"

"Well, excuse me," Zelgadis sniffed, but stopped moving.

"Ah! There!" She pointed, "I found _something_," Amelia frowned, "but, Lina-san… isn't this supposed to be a Ryuzoku temple?" she asked as the glow of her magic faded.

"Yeah, what about it?" Lina as already taking off in the direction Amelia had pointed. Scrambling, the others followed her run. The vines snapped at their heels, but Lina on the trail of a magical artifact was almost as fast as Lina-in-sight-of-a-restaurant or even Lina-within-reach-of-large-amounts-of-gold.

"Well," Amelia panted, "It feels more like black magic, but I suppose…"

"Hey, this temple's from before the War of the Monsters' Fall, right?" Lina raced faster, stars in her eyes, "Maybe it's some enchanted weapon!"

"I thought it was meant to be for healing," Zelgadis grated. He was the fastest of the group and had yet to break a sweat.

"Yeah, well, maybe it's not." Lina shrugged. "Don't worry, Zel!" She added brightly, "We'll find your cure some other time!" This only moved Zelgadis to dark mutterings. "Ya-ha!" Lina skidded to a stop in sight of a heavyset marble altar. Atop it lay a small, square chest.

"Uh, Lina-san…" Amelia trailed off, eyeing the altar with a sick face. "Are those cockroaches?"

"Who cares! They're not slugs!" Lina flicked the creatures aside and pulled the top from the case.

She blinked. "It's…"

Gourry peered over her shoulder. "An eggplant," he identified. "Looks tasty," he added.

"Don't even _think_ about it," Lina growled. "Amelia! Is this what you felt earlier?"

Amelia nodded. "Who would enchant an eggplant?"

"A Ryuzoku?" Xellos suggested helpfully from right behind her. She jumped at shrieked.

"_Why_ are you never around when the fighting starts?" Lina snarled at him, clutching her new eggplant to her chest protectively.

Xellos smiled. "Well, I wouldn't want you to grow dependent!" He gave an irritating laugh.

"Fat chance," Lina mumbled. "Anyway! What do _you_ know about this thing?" she waved the eggplant at him.

Xellos shrugged. "I wouldn't know anything about something you found in a Ryuzoku temple, Lina-san," he said, "although if you do happen to find a ruby in one of them, I'd be happy to hold onto it for safekeeping!" he added cheerfully.

"AS IF WE'D DO THAT!!"

"It was a nice thought."

Zelgadis eyed him. "Where did you go?"

"Home," Xellos said, then smiled. "To change my pants! I got singed…" he sniffled. Zelgadis gave him a skeptical look. Since he knew that Xellos's clothing was an extension of his physical manifestation, it was well deserved.

"Where _is_ your home?" Amelia asked suddenly.

"Secret!" Xellos smiled, at the same time as Lina said, "Wolf Pack Island."

He blinked. "Ah, I should have known that our resident black magic expert would know," he said.

"Yeah, well, what I don't know is if Dolphin's after you, or me," she said pointedly. "You wouldn't happen to know anything about that, would you, Xellos?"

"Nope," Xellos grinned at her. She made frustrated noises at him for a moment or two and then turned back around. Grumbling, she marched back the way they'd come, fireballing every vaguely hostile thing she found in the process.

Xellos met Zelgadis's eyes with a serious gaze, all hint of a smile gone. Zelgadis raised an eyebrow and Xellos shrugged it off.

Finally, he said, "An eggplant, huh?"

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Another chapter. Reviewers are loved.

Yasi


	4. The Summoning

Back again. Not bad, given that I've had three SACs (School Assessed Coursework) this week.

See first chapter for disclaimer.

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Zelgadis, honestly, wasn't having the best evening. It started to rain three kilometres from the nearest inn (one they hadn't been kicked out of yet, anyway). That part he blamed on Lina.

It also happened to be the only inn in a city of some size, and it was, of course, on the side opposite to the gate through which they entered.

As they approached the gate, the bored, wet guards looked up at them. "Halt, there," one of them called.

"'Halt'?" Amelia blinked. "Isn't that a bit archaic?"

Lina shrugged. "Just stop. We can always bribe them." Amelia looked ready to protest, but Gourry's nod of agreement stopped her.

"What is your business here in Ferious?"

"Ferious..?" Zelgadis blinked. The name was the first part of a summoning spell, and it drew him from his own private pool of misery. He was entitled to his pool – he couldn't remember losing his virginity to Xellos, although certain parts of his anatomy had informed him it was true, he'd been attacked by a Mazoku sent by a _new_ evil demon lord, and his latest cure had turned out to be an eggplant. Yes, he was definitely entitled.

"Ahahahaha, don't mind him!" Lina said nervously, leaping in front of him while Amelia tugged on his hood and mask; they worked smoothly as a team. Zelgadis took the hint, shook Amelia off and adjusted his clothing. "We're just innocent travellers, looking for somewhere to rest between adventures!" she waved her arms for emphasis.

"What about the guy behind you?"

"Well, you know these powerful sorcerers!" Xellos chirped, leaning into the guard's face. "They do such strange things to themselves in pursuit of power!" he glanced over his shoulder, where Amelia had gone slightly pale, glancing between Zelgadis and Xellos. "Don't you agree, Guard-san?" He was very much in his personal space, but the guard didn't move to remove him by force. Of course. Who would strike a priest?

_Me_, Zelgadis thought, and glowered at him.

"Well, I wouldn't know much about that," the guard looked him up and down. "But you seem a respectable sort of fellow yourself, Padre, so I'll take your word on it."

As the group behind him facefaulted, Xellos nodded along. "Yes, quite respectable," he agreed brightly. "Come along now, my faithful followers."

"Padre?" Amelia asked when they were through the gates. "Xellos-san, what does that mean?"

Xellos pulled out his copy of The Top 100 Facts About World History from his bag and flipped through a couple of pages. The book did not get wet, despite the sheets of rain falling from above. "Priest," he said, sounding disappointed. "Well, basically."

"You mean you didn't KNOW?" Lina growled.

"No… should I have?" Xellos cocked his head.

"'Basically'?" Zelgadis repeated suspiciously.

"Is there _anything_ that isn't in that book?" Amelia asked.

"Maa… well, it's actually a kind of military title. Originally, it was a priest who travelled with the army, but apparently, in this area, it's the name for priests dedicated solely to the eradication of Mazoku!" he said cheerfully. "Ah, I see. They wear black, to identify themselves. What a wonderful innovation."

"Uh… should you really be so enthusiastic about that?" Gourry asked.

Xellos's smile only widened.

Lina shared a glance with Amelia. "Suddenly, I have a bad feeling about this."

Zelgadis didn't even comment. He walked straight past his stalling companions in the direction of the inn. Squawking, the others followed.

Xellos began to hum.

The interior of the inn was warm, well-lit and cosy. They were cooking something that smelt truly delicious, and the patrons appeared to be orderly families. "Hi!" Lina said when the innkeeper approached her. "We need two rooms for the night," she smiled brightly.

The innkeeper looked the group over. His eyes landed on Zelgadis. "Sorry, no rooms."

"Ah, but the sign outside says 'vacancy'…" Amelia trailed off, following the innkeeper's gaze. "Oh."

Zelgadis gave a slow, catlike blink. "I'm not with them," he said flatly and turned on his heel.

"Zel! Zel – what are you –"

"Lina, this is the _only_ inn," he pointed out.

The innkeeper's voice floated behind him, hemming and hawing as he talked to Amelia. "Maybe we have a room or two left, if that's the case… early checkouts…"

Zelgadis nodded, waved off Lina's enraged protests and left to let them retrieve room numbers and keys. His feet made heavy thuds on the wooden floors. The door opened just as he reached for it, and a man in a priest's robe stumbled into him. He glanced up, and blinked.

"You're…" his eyes widened. "Padre!" he yelped. "_Padre!_"

Zelgadis sighed and pushed past him. The icy wind that blew in from the street was enough to make him want to pause, but then somebody else bumped into him. "Will _none_ of you watch where you're going?" he demanded.

"Oh, I'm sorry, boy…" the man wore clothing similar to the other's, except it was black. Black – Zelgadis's eyes widened. Really, he should have expected it.

"Padre, look, he's some kind of demon! Get away from him!" Heads turned.

The priest blinked at him. "Why, so he is." He sounded very mild about it. People, cloaked against the chill and rain, sidled closer.

"No, I'm not," Zelgadis growled, but wondered why he bothered arguing. It only attracted more attention, and he didn't feel like being the freak today.

Not that he ever really _did_.

"You're not?" The Padre leaned in and squinted at him. "Well, you look a bit odd, but you're no demon _I've_ ever seen. I've seen a few, you know."

"I'm sure you have. Kindly get out of my way." Zelgadis stared him down.

The man did not look intimidated. "Ah, but I'm afraid I can't let you leave until I've determined if you really _are_ a demon," the Padre did sound regretful.

Zelgadis's eyes went flat. "Listen, you old fool, I haven't had the best of days. You don't want to try my patience right now."

"Maa… Zelgadis-san, do calm down. I'm sure this can be resolved without resorting to anything unfortunate." Xellos shimmered into existence beside him.

The demon-hunter and his – apprentice, perhaps? – eyed both of them warily. Xellos smiled brightly. Rain splattered onto the cobblestones.

"And now, my day is complete." Zelgadis shouldered his way out of the crowd and began marching towards the nearest city exit. Xellos could deal with the excitement if he really wanted to.

There was a sizzle and deep words intoned in a foreign language. The white circle snapped into place around Zelgadis. He stopped moving. The fact that the old priest could cast a circle like that without drawing it out beforehand suggested that he was powerful enough to be a threat, but more disconcerting even than that was the feeling as the magic shivered over his astral form, too.

Xellos gave an impressed whistle in the ensuing silence. "My, that is certainly an… interesting technique," he commented mildly.

Zelgadis would have loosed a scathing retort, but he couldn't move.

The Padre stepped carefully around the edges of his circle, still muttering in that other tongue, and bent to the edge of the circle in front of Zelgadis's motionless form. His fingertips brushed the white glow. The point of contact smoked.

When he straightened, there was a sheen of sweat on his brow, but his eyes were hard. "Not a Mazoku," he said, "but a demon nonetheless, however you may try to disguise your physical form!"

Disguise his …? Zelgadis choked on the rage that came with that accusation. On its tail was a wave of inky blue depression. He ignored it in favour of frothing at the mouth.

He couldn't see Xellos, but from the lack of smart-ass comments, the _real_ demon had either beat a hasty retreat at the prospect of being discovered himself, or was silently lapping up the negativity Zelgadis was radiating. Zelgadis narrowed his eyes at the Padre, but could not move his mouth.

The door to the inn behind him splintered.

"What the HELL is going on here?" Clearly, Lina had been interrupted whilst eating. If Zelgadis had been able to turn, he might have noticed the ecstatic twist to Xellos's smile as he self-righteous anger overflowed.

"Zelgadis-san!" Amelia's voice cracked into the higher ranges, prompting winces from the gathered crowd. She quickly recovered, and her voice soared. "What foul villains dare imprison an Ally of Justice in their Snare of Evil?" she demanded of those gathered there.

The crowd stepped back as one. Zelgadis couldn't blame them.

The Padre, however, stepped forward. "You know, of course, that in bringing a demon into Ferious, you have violated one of our most ancient laws. You could be executed with him."

Amelia blinked. Lina began to protest her innocence. To give her some credit, though, she didn't claim not to know him. It might have been better for her if she had, but whatever mercenary qualities Lina did possess, they didn't extend to the treatment of her friends.

Executed. They never could just cut a deal. It was always, "drive him out of town!" or "execute him". Zelgadis would have sighed, except that he _still couldn't move_.

Until something shifted on the astral plane. Zelgadis blinked and made no sudden movements.

"Come on now, Zelgadis-san, while everybody is paying attention to Amelia, ne?" Xellos's voice whispered. Zelgadis couldn't see him. He considered the possible consequences of following Xellos, but quickly decided that it was better than waiting around until the good citizens of Ferious found something that could kill him, or Lina lost her temper and blow the city sky-high. A matter of 'the devil you know', so to speak.

He straightened his spine and slunk out of the circle. As soon as his foot escaped that glowing white line, his sense of the astral plane returned to normal.

The confused yelling of Amelia and Lina continued for a moment, punctuated occasionally by Gourry's queries of, "so, what's going on?" Then there was a startled yelp as Amelia was hit, or pulled aside or something. Zelgadis distinctly heard the words, _diplomatic immunity_.

Then a gloved hand snapped around his wrist and _yanked_. He was through the crowd and swathed in the welcoming shadow of a receding doorway.

Through the crowd, he saw a flash of red, and found Lina's eyes. She winked. He left. This city wasn't particularly welcoming. Lina and the others could stay in their inn – he would have to sleep outside its limits to feel safe.

Xellos reappeared about three blocks away from the city gates. "You know," he said, "there's an abandoned house that way. The locals all believe it's haunted."

"What do you care?"

"Because I need to talk to you." Xellos tempered his serious tone by following it with, I can answer some of your questions, if you like, Zelgadis-san!"

"Who knows? Maybe you'll even be honest about it," Zelgadis snarled.

"Maybe," Xellos agreed as though he hadn't heard the sarcasm.

"Well, you can just as easily do it outside the city."

"Hmmm, yes," Xellos agreed. "I could, but wouldn't you be more comfortable _without_ rain dripping from your nose, Zelgadis-san?" he asked cheerfully.

"No," Zelgadis growled, just to be contrary, "I wouldn't."

Xellos smiled. Zelgadis tried to pretend he didn't know that Xellos would only profit from him spending a long, cold night camping out alone. He failed.

"Where is it?"

Xellos's smile glowed. "Just this way."

Twenty minutes later, Zelgadis was soaked to the bone. Xellos appeared to be lost.

Ten minutes after that, Xellos appeared to be leading him in circles.

Three seconds after this realisation, Xellos appeared to be nothing so much as a steaming pile of goo.

He bounced back and pointed. "Ah! There it is!"

Zelgadis followed his gaze, and felt sweat roll down the back of his head. That castle had not been there a moment ago, he was _sure_ of it. It was a massive, crumbling ruin on a hill, surrounded by walls that implied their builder had been very nervous about invasion.

"Perfect," he muttered, feeling raindrops trickle down his neck.

"Come on, this way!" Xellos tugged on his arm before he had a chance to protest, his hand warm and dry in the rain. He would have pulled away, except that he had the distinct feeling he'd end up on his arse on the mud-slick cobblestones, considering how smooth they'd been worn.

Zelgadis tore his arm away from Xellos as soon as they were behind the wall surrounding the ruined castle, rubbing his wrist and glaring from under his bangs. As Xellos blinked innocently at him, a drop of water slid smoothly down the wire.

"Ne, Zel, doesn't your hair rus –" he was cut off in a gurgle as Zelgadis very deliberately ran him through.

He pulled his sword out of Xellos's digestive tract and sheathed it without even checking to see if there was blood; experience told him that Xellos wouldn't bleed unless Lina cast something fairly serious on him, or sliced him open with the Sword of Light.

And even that had healed pretty fast, much to Zelgadis's chagrin.

Scowling, he stalked towards the ruin. Xellos floated behind him, bemoaning his harsh treatment. Zelgadis clenched his jaw and ignored him.

"Well?" he demanded as soon as he was under shelter.

"Hmmm?"

He paused in the act of stripping off his cloak and hood. "I _thought_," he emphasised, "you wanted to ask me something?"

"Business already, Zelgadis-san?" Xellos sighed, coming to rest lightly on his – _dry!_ – feet. Even his hair was still dry.

Zelgadis scowled and didn't respond. He didn't want to know what Xellos's response would be if he rose to the bait and asked. "I can always leave," he said instead.

Xellos shrugged. "Maybe so," he said, "but I think the Padre from before, or another like him, would find you. You attracted quite a few curious glances following me around in the rain and cursing. The spellfire, particularly, drew eyeballs, although I can't imagine why…"

"You – you –" Zelgadis stumbled. He struggled to find a word vile enough to call Xellos.

"Me?"

"You did that on purpose!"

Xellos cocked his head and considered his companion thoughtfully. "Yes," he said finally. "I suppose I did." He paused. "Well, it worked out for the best, anyway."

"How is this for the best?" Zelgadis demanded hotly. "I'm stuck in a stinking ruin in the rain with _you_, while Mazoku-hunters are probably tailing us here trying to _kill me_, and Lina is three miles away, probably still _inhaling her dinner_ in her _nice, warm inn_!!"

"Well, Lina-san _is_ probably still eating, at least," Xellos said. A neatly-balanced pile of wood that had not been there moments before caught light when Xellos glanced at it.

Zelgadis stared at it. "Where are we?" he asked slowly.

Xellos smiled. "In a ruin, in the rain." He held his hands out to the fire. "Come closer. It's warm."

"I don't think so. Where –?"

"Oh, well. Suit yourself." Xellos dropped into a cross-legged position. "Now, what do you remember about yesterday night?"

Zelgadis's stomach clenched. "Truthfully, I've been trying not to think about it," he muttered. They were silent for a few long moments. "I remember…"

– _breaking glass; slivers and shards at his feet, silver; grass and trees and his reflection in running water with green eyes –_

His clumsy thoughts chased the memory like a werewolf chasing its tail.

– _Xellos's pupils burning down to slits, irises backlit and unreflective; power trickling down his spine, something huge shouldering its way up from the depths of the astral plane; green acid and the burning touch of skin –_

It slipped through the inky tendrils of his mind like water and splashed in little droplets to the bottom of his conscious, where they lurked and refused to surface.

"Nothing," he sighed. "I remember nothing."

Xellos quirked an eyebrow at him. "Nothing at all?"

Zelgadis sat by the fire, no longer content to feel ridiculous for refusing the invitation. "It's like I can remember it if I'm not trying to." His brow furrowed in frustration. His hair flashed a steely smile in the firelight and cast strange reflections onto his face. "I try to think about it, and then suddenly I can't remember a thing at all."

Well, almost. He could still remember that single touch of Xellos's skin like a firebrand.

He flushed, but it made him think. "Xellos…" he said it slowly.

Xellos looked a little too interested in that flush. "Yes?"

"How hot is your skin? Normally, I mean." Zelgadis cut his eyes at the figure across the fire from him. He looked away again. Outside, the rain poured. It splashed from the edge of the decrepit stone roof to the floor of the ruins and ran towards one corner.

For a wonder, he got a straight, if slightly confused, answer. "Not much warmer than a normal human's."

"Can you make it hotter?"

"Of course. But, that wouldn't be very healthy, would it?" he gave that irritating laughter again. Zelgadis, who had just been relaxing into something like concentration, felt like strangling him.

"I suppose you do have to exist on this plane to affect it, then," Zelgadis said, noting in passing that he'd just sank a century's worth of philosophers' musings. "You can't just retreat into the astral plane and do all your damage from there, can you?"

Xellos raised his eyebrows. "I don't know about that."

Zelgadis snorted. "Isn't that your specialty?" he asked, thinking back to what Garv had said.

"Is it?" Xellos cocked his head. "Where are you going with this line of questioning, Zelgadis-san?"

Zelgadis shifted closer to the fire, trying to ignore the way the shadows of the ruins shuddered, curved and swarmed to rub against Xellos like puppies to their master. He frowned. "I do remember that your hands were hot. Like you might have blistered me, if I'd been human."

Xellos's eyes were open. Zelgadis only rarely got a glimpse of those eyes, and most of the time they were narrowed at something or someone, hard and gelid with some horrible desire. At the moment, however, they were just staring blankly into the fire, and Zelgadis had to think that maybe it wasn't the eyes themselves that looked so very unnatural, but the driving force behind them.

"Well, isn't that… interesting," he said softly.

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Isn't it? We have a town with Mazoku-hunters where those connected to them are executed with them, some strange and powerful white magic that works on the astral plane, the meddling of Dolphin (or is it? Do you think I know?), Xellos's and Zelgadis's memories being screwed with and, scarier yet, the two of them cooperating. Sort of.

Feedback generally responded to!

- Yasi


	5. The Burning

See first chapter for disclaimer.

Chapter Five: in which things go "BOOM" and Zelgadis is classically conditioned to blush every time he thinks of cookies.

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The moonlight was weak through the inky storm clouds, but the occasional flash of lightning blasted the room with light through diaphanous curtains, Gourry separated from the girls by the wall of the inn. Lina knew he was asleep, because she could hear him snoring, just as she knew that Amelia was asleep because she could hear her slurred mumblings about Justice drifting from the opposite bed.

She laid awake, arms folded beneath her neck, waiting for the next flash to illuminate the world again, counting the seconds between the lightning and thunder and wondering where Zel was. Probably camping out in it. She scowled at the timbre roof. The next rumble of thunder seemed to shake the very foundations of the building.

Then she blinked as a thin trail of dirt trickled down onto her nose.

She growled and spat and brushed it off, sitting upright. There was a louder rumble, and the stream of dirt began again.

That was odd. It sort of reminded her of –

"_Amelia!_" she yelled, catching the girl's wrist and throwing them both out the window. Her magic softened their fall from the second storey. Lina had a bare second to clatter to her feet on the wet cobblestones and run back towards the building.

"_GOURRY!_" Her scream could have woken the dead, so it had at least a fifty percent chance of waking Gourry.

Lina stopped in her tracks as the building exploded. Smoke and hot air streamed towards her, catching up her hair and sending her clothes into disarray. She held up her arms to protect her face from the flying wood splinters. Behind her, she could hear Amelia's confused yelling.

She was coughing when the smoke had cleared and the ash had settled, and there was a finger-sized wooden ship sticking out of her arm. She shook that out impatiently and started towards the wreckage.

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Zelgadis, having listened to Xellos talk for the past several hours, was _astounded_ by his ability to say ­_absolutely nothing_ in so very many words. Getting information from Xellos was not so much like getting blood from a rock as it was like killing a god: not actually _impossible_, just difficult, work-intensive and very improbable. Zelgadis looked upon it as a challenge and had resolved not to try to kill him. Much. "So, what you're saying is, we _are _being screwed with by someone, but it really could be anyone."

"Within a certain power limit," Xellos lifted one shoulder in a shrug. His hands were wrapped around one raised knee where his chin rested. His staff over one thigh and under the arch made by the other knee, dangerously close to the fire.

"How many people are within that power limit?"

"Probably a few," he stared at the flickering fire. It had yet to require more wood. Zelgadis was cold enough that he crept closer to it with suspicion.

"What kind of a power limit are we talking about?" Zelgadis gritted his teeth. "Does it have to be powerful like a Dark Lord, or can it be powerful like, say, Lina?"

"…Powerful."

"Damn you! Why can't you give me a _straight_ answer for once?" Zelgadis swung the flat of his blade across the fire, on a collision course with Xellos's head.

Xellos didn't even dodge it, just held up a hand and stopped the sword and then eyed him from under his ridiculous bangs in a very odd look. "Now, look," he sighed. "Your questions are mostly irrelevant, and as to comparing Lina's power with a Dark Lord's – you tell me!"

Zelgadis tugged half-heartedly on the sword, but it wasn't going anywhere. He didn't let it go, though; the last thing he needed was to be unarmed. He supposed, grudgingly, that he had a point on that last part. "My questions are _not_ irrelevant," he growled, ignoring that, "I'm trying to come up with a set of criteria so we can figure out who the hell we're dealing with!"

Xellos touched his temple. "Zelgadis-san," he sighed, closing his eyes, "that's not the _point_. If you let yourself get set in any one idea about whom this person is, you're going to be wrong-footed when you're wrong." He let go of the sword, straightened his spine and smiled brightly. "Now, how about some cookies?"

Zelgadis fell over with a strangled sound.

"Ano… Zelgadis-san?" Xellos asked, suddenly leaning over his supine form with a concerned pout. "Is something wrong? You don't like cookies?"

"Coo – nnng!" Zelgadis spluttered.

"Oh, my. Is your friend okay, Xellos?" The low burr in the voice made his bones vibrate. "I've never seen a human choke on _nothing_ before," she added with a feigned sincerity so realistic that Zelgadis looked over at her for familial resemblance.

What he saw was a petite woman with long blonde tresses. She had a multitude of jingling, gold bangles around her dainty wrists and ankles and firm, dark skin that curved with the highlights of the occasional, bold strike of lightning. Her eyes were luminescent purple, feral and inviting.

She was naked.

Zelgadis felt his face go hot. Xellos was studying him with interest, and a rising concern that didn't seem feigned at all. "GAH! CLOTHING!" he managed before he fainted, with incredulous, slightly-nervous laughter echoing in his ears.

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"Maaa… I'm sorry?" Gourry said, rubbing his head. "What did I do wrong?"

They were in the basement of a decrepit, abandoned house. After scouring the area around the city in the air for any traces of Zelgadis and finding none, they'd relocated to somewhere that was at least dry. Amelia's lighting spell and their camping blankets almost made the place seem sort of cozy.

Well. The roof didn't leak, anyway.

"You went out for a SNACK? In the middle of the NIGHT? _WITHOUT ME?_" Lina shrieked, pacing.

Amelia watched on with amused tolerance. "Gourry-san, she's just letting off steam," she said very softly, but not so softly that Lina's ear didn't twitch, "we were worried about you!"

"AHH! No! No, no, no, no!" Lina said, very close to Amelia's face and blushing bright red all of a sudden.

She blinked. "You weren't?"

"Of course not! I was worried that my _sword_ might be destroyed in the explosion!" Lina declared, pointing at the sword at Gourry's waist.

"But, Lina…" Amelia frowned at it, and then looked back up at her. "You enchanted that sword yourself, didn't you?" she asked. It was true. Upon losing the Sword of Light, they'd had to hand-enchant another weapon for Gourry, because there was a distinct lack of other weapons that used, 'Light come forth' as an incantation, and Gourry kept forgetting the others. Lina's was, admittedly, a poor comparison to the lauded Sword of Light, but it was better than just steel.

"So?"

"Well… couldn't you have just –" 

Lina cut her off by whacking her upside the head. "NO, okay?" she demanded.

Amelia squeaked and nodded, still confused but refusing to show it. Instead, she turned back to Gourry. "But, we are glad you weren't caught in the explosion," she said with a smile.

"Me, too," said Gourry, still rubbing the sore spot on his head

Lina stopped pacing. "So I guess we are being targeted," she muttered to herself. "But an explosion doesn't seem like a Mazoku's style," she said, flopping to her backside on the floor.

"Why?" Amelia asked. It was underhanded and safe for whoever was instigating it; it sounded perfect for a Mazoku. If Gourry _had_ been inside that inn… She didn't say anything, just waited, subdued.

Lina waved her off. "They wouldn't have anybody to gloat to before or after, assuming they thought Xellos and Zel were still in the building – although, I guess that means they're not targeting Xellos."

"That blast wouldn't have killed him," Amelia agreed. "But if it wasn't a Mazoku…"

Lina sighed. "We're looking at this all wrong. I just know it," she muttered. Gourry blinked between them and wisely kept his mouth shut. Amelia leaned back against the wall and stared pensively at her toes.

-------------------------------- 

Short chapter. Promise more plot next time.


	6. The Chemical

See first chapter for disclaimer.

Ah, yeah... this chapter is slightly more graphic with the sex. Not anything that the site would disapprove of, but if you're squicky about that stuff, please skip it.

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Zelgadis's eyelashes fluttered. Consciousness was a distant haze of firelight and wood smoke and amused voices.

Somewhere else, he felt hot fingertips trailing down his ribs, along his hips, slowing when they reached his thighs. His skin was oversensitive as though he was sick. He was blind here, but the sound of his own breathing was fast. The sudden, bruising pressure of the hands on him alerted Zelgadis to the fact that he was dreaming; nobody could dig into his stone skin like that, so he had to be human here.

The dream did not dissipate, and he became sharply aware that he was on his back and blind. His skin seemed as insubstantial as tissue now, as though anybody could reach underneath and rip out handfuls of flesh. He grasped blindly towards the person above him. The burning hands caught his own and pinned them.

Someone was breathing across his stomach. He jerked in response. His muscles clenched. He arched, arms straining against the overheated hands holding him down. There was movement, pressure, heat. His breath hissed.

He knew that laugh.

His blindness receded, and he saw for just a moment, a sliver of a grin and a body that didn't quite seem real, as though it was merely a vessel for the massive, fierce energy smouldering between here and the astral plane, smoking quietly –

- but it was gone, and he was staring into a pair of violet eyes that weren't Xellos's. They crackled.

"He's awake!" The woman was finally wearing clothing. An apron, anyway – one that left her long, long legs bare to the upper reaches of her thighs. Zelgadis was still on the ground, so even though he was getting more than an eyeful of cleavage as she bent over him, he hoped she wasn't going to straighten up anytime soon. "Hello, Zelgadis-san! Would you like a cookie?"

She held out a tray he could have sworn was not there fifteen seconds ago. Atop it rested six or seven large, chocolaty cookies. As soon as he thought about it, he could smell them. They were still warm.

He blinked slowly. "Who the hell are you?"

"Cookie first," she insisted.

Zelgadis accepted a cookie with no intention of eating it. Xellos was still slouched across the other side of the fire, flashing a very amused little smile. As soon as the cookie was in his hand, however, Zelgadis developed a great desire to at least try a little bit of it. After all, it was so… chocolaty. And it was not as though Zelgadis ate enough.

The cookie was halfway to his mouth before he realized that he was about to take a bite of something given to him by a strange Mazoku lady, and that there was clearly some subtle trickery going on here. He dropped it.

She crouched and caught the cookie in one smooth movement. "Now, Zelgadis," she sighed, spinning it around between her long, dexterous fingers and pouting at him.

He scowled right back. "Who are you, and what's wrong with the cookie?"

"Is he always this difficult?" she sighed again, glancing over at Xellos. Zelgadis felt lighter in that moment. He scrambled to his feet and backed away.

"No. Sometimes he's worse." Xellos smiled brightly. "Really, he's being quite polite… considering."

The woman sighed. "I am Xellas Metallium, Greater Beast, Beastmaster, She Who Never Loses Her Prey, etcetera, etcetera. I see you've got the general gist," she added as Zelgadis started glancing around for his sword. "But I presently mean you no harm – not that your panic isn't highly amusing, but it is a little less than conducive to the conversation."

The Beastmaster was beautiful when she smiled. It was so disarming. Then again, their entire group had been fooled by the Hellmaster's guise. Zelgadis narrowed his eyes at her. "Which conversation?"

She pouted. "The one you were just having. Anyway. Have a cookie." Her smile narrowed down into something more like Xellos's I've-got-a-secret smile. It suited her better. "I made them just for you!"

That did not make him feel any better for some reason. He licked his lips. Normally, this was where he would snap and tell her to leave him alone. Since she was being so nice just then, however, and because he was pretty sure he couldn't count on Xellos's assistance if it came down to a fight, he was slightly more polite. "So what's wrong with them?"

"Nothing's wrong with them!" Xellas gave him an offended look. "Cooking's a hobby of mine! And maybe they'll jog your memory, you know?" Her sharp canines caught the firelight.

"Then why not feed them to Xellos?" he eyed the cookie suspiciously. "He'd probably have a better idea of what went on, anyway, wouldn't he?"

"Mazoku metabolism," she shrugged. "He'd need… hundreds. Or possibly a completely different concentration." She seemed to lose patience. "Are you going to eat it?"

From the faintly hopeful glimmer in her dark purple eyes, he understood that a negative answer was going to result in her shoving it down his throat, with the maximum possible amount of choking and futile struggling.

Grudgingly, Zelgadis took the offered cookie. Two sets of purple eyes watched him with what he felt was a little too much curiosity as he took a bite. The cookie was actually very tasty, but it had a strange aftertaste that reminded him of burnt almonds.

Then he lost consciousness again.

--------------------------------

Xellos sweatdropped as Zelgadis dropped, unsurprisingly, like a rock. "Ano… how much…?"

"Enough," Xellas's smile disappeared. She snatched up Zelgadis's inert form by his shirt with one hand and balanced her cookie tray with the other. Dumping him closer to the fire, she left the cookies beside him and curled up next to Xellos. "If the memories have been contained and not simply erased, he'll definitely remember. And he doesn't act like there's a chunk of his mind missing, so it's likely to succeed."

Xellos frowned. "But… won't that make him sick?"

Xellas's dark eyes slid over her servant's face. Even though his eyes were open, his expression was impassive. "Do you care so very much, Xellos?"

"No." He looked back into the fire.

The Beastmaster lit a cigarette with a spark of power and smiled a little. "Are you sure? It _has_ been a long time –"

"Do you really think that now is an appropriate moment to find myself… entangled?" he cut in with unusual sharpness.

She snorted, rising to her feet and taking a long, calming drag. "Since when are you appropriate? Anyway, do what you want. Report to me if he remembers." She shimmered out of existence.

In the distance, wolves screamed.

Xellos smiled into the fire, his face unreadable.

--------------------------------

In the morning, Lina, Amelia and Gourry stumbled out of the abandoned basement and into the bright light of day. The rain had finally stopped, leaving the morning crisp and cool, with little droplets of clear water still dribbling from the leaves of trees planted on the roadsides. Lina stretched widely, yawning, and stepped over the threshold…

…and right into an angry mob. Despite the bright sunlight, they were armed with flaming torches. She could see a few priests, ostensibly unarmed but for the occasional walking staff, but their black cloaks made her consider them far more dangerous than the civilians.

"Call me cynical," she quipped, "but why don't I think this is a coincidence?"

Amelia nodded gravely at her side.

One of the priests stepped forward to speak. "Where is it?" he demanded.

Lina blinked. "…it?" she repeated dumbly.

"The demon," he said patiently. "We need to locate it to get rid of it. Then your names are cleared, and no more unfortunate accidents may become you."

"No more… it was you!" Amelia yelped, pointing her finger. "You could have hurt somebody! You foul villain! How dare you –"

"It was not me," the priest responded placidly, "but the locals do not appreciate the presence of the demonic alongside their wives and children," he said. "There is nothing we can do to control the entire population," he spread his hands wide, "so it is best if we are allowed to deal with the demon and leave travelers like yourselves in peace."

Lina's eyes narrowed. There were any number of things she could say to that, but she settled for the truth. "Zelgadis wasn't even in the inn. He left the city last night – after you attacked him."

The priest frowned. "He was causing a commotion with one of our priests just after he escaped that alleged attack," he said gravely. "Spellfire and hissing and cursing like you wouldn't believe…" he shook his head and returned to the point. "If you've lost track of it, you'll have to be held responsible for loosing a demon in our quiet city."

Amelia waved her hands. "No, no, that's not what it looks like! He and Xellos are, sort of, um, friends! It's a love-hate relationship! Really! And anyway, Zelgadis wouldn't hurt a f – well, he wouldn't hurt someone who didn't really annoy him, anyway…" she trailed off, trying to think of a nice, honest way to put it and failing.

Lina growled and eschewed diplomacy altogether. "Yeah? WELL BRING IT ON, MISTER!"

She lunged. Gourry caught her under the arms and hissed, "Lina! There's hundreds of them," at the same time as Amelia pulled out her crest of Seyrunn.

Lina elbowed Gourry in the stomach and snatched at Amelia's arm. "Don't show them that!" She shrieked.

"But Lina… the fastest way out of this mess is to claim diplomatic immunity and just leave the city, so –"

"Shut up!" Lina's eyes burned with rage and suppressed stress. "I'm going to blow them up!" she shrieked. Then she glanced around to find a conveniently placed rock.

The angry mob looked on with curiosity as the short redhead scrambled to the top of her rock and took a deep breath. Then she began to chant, "Darkness beyond twilight, crimson beyond blood that flows, buried in the flow of time…"

At least half to the priests went ashen and began either running or preparing the strongest defensive spells in their repertoires, but it was too late. Gourry and Amelia just sighed and closed their eyes against the bright light that accompanied a dragon slave, and tried to ignore both the screams of agony as priests and civilians burned to death in a fiery blast of raw black magic and the maniacal laughter of their comrade as she relieved stress.

When half of the city was nothing more than a smoking crater, Lina turned back to them. "Ah, that felt _great_," she said, stretching and cracking her neck. "Let's go grab some breakfast and find Zel. Mmm, I could eat a dragon_."_

"I'm not sure that Filia-san would approve of that," Amelia suggested delicately, sidestepping the carnage.

"It's a figure of speech! Come on! Food! Food! Food!" Lina began the chant, and Gourry joined in. With a faint smile, Amelia picked up her pace.

Finding food, however, would prove to be a lot easier than finding Zelgadis.

--------------------------------

Zelgadis was unconscious for the better part of the next two days, but when he awoke, his memory was intact. Graphically so.

He came to beside the fire that didn't seem to require anything as mundane as wood or tending. Xellos was still sitting exactly as he'd left him, staring blankly into the fire. The only way he could tell that any time had passed at all was the absence of the Beastmaster and her obnoxious cookies, and the stiffness in his own limbs – along with the burgeoning headache from caffeine deprivation.

"Remember anything?"

Xellos had been whispering, but the noise felt like a stiletto through his brainstem. Zelgadis cringed. "My head hurts," he croaked. His throat hurt, too. He rolled onto his stomach slowly, feeling the remnants of his brain slosh around inside his skull, and made it almost to his knees before he threw up.

The acidic burn of his own bile through his nose and throat made it difficult to breathe. On all fours, he coughed and sputtered without actually bringing anything up – he hadn't eaten anything in two days, so there wasn't actually much to vomit. Small mercies. Finally, he lurched away from the puddle and slumped back to the fire-warmed ground.

Xellos watched with mild curiosity. "I did tell her it would make you sick," he said conversationally after a moment.

"What was _in_ those cookies?" Zelgadis managed. His voice sounded weak, but it had enough of a growl in it to satisfy his ego.

Xellos looked, through the crack of Zelgadis's eyelids, as though he was contemplating actually answering that, but he just said, "You don't really want to know. What do you remember?"

Zelgadis swallowed and closed his eyes, relaxing into the heat of the fire. He remembered feeling sick after they'd arrived at that little inn and stumbling to the river to get away from the lights and noise and people.

"Why… why were you by the river, that day?" The grass had been cold under his hands when he had dropped down at the riverbank.

"The river?" Xellos repeated blankly. "I don't remember." If that bothered him, Zelgadis couldn't tell in his tone.

He sighed. "I went to the river. You were there. If you don't know why, I certainly don't."

Xellos hummed. "I'll ask Juu-ou-sama. Go on."

Xellos had been less obnoxious than normal. He'd seemed oddly unsettled, his eyes flickering over their surroundings over and over. The river slowly turned dark as dusk turned to dark. Sick and annoyed at Xellos's reappearance, Zelgadis hadn't noticed at all. Xellos hadn't even noticed that some other power was subtly poisoning it – and all of its surroundings – until it was too late.

Zelgadis's memory became fuzzy here. Smoke had turned into ominous shapes which fluttered like winged snakes through the air, the grass had seemed poisonously bright, everything had been too vivid, too loud, too intense. His eyes were green with sharp, slit-pupils in the running water, and his skin had seemed neither human nor golem but that paler colour of the brau demon.

He had stopped paying attention to Xellos's increasingly ill humour, stumbled away from the river and collapsed half-conscious to the freezing grass. For what seemed like days he'd stared at the hazy starlight and hadn't felt the will to move. Icy tendrils of apathy encompassed him, but he could feel the aggressive pulse and shudder of the world's energy all around him, swiftly closing in.

Xellos had hauled him to his feet and propelled him with surprising force. "Get away from the river," he'd hissed in his ear, but his hands on Zelgadis's shoulders were growing hotter with every step, and the strength seemed to leave him.

They stumbled back into the town, but the fever wouldn't leave either of them – if anything, it seemed to be getting worse. Zelgadis's memory was one of whirling colours, of trees and grass and shattered glass, and then of Xellos turning to him, his pupils burning down to slits, irises backlit and unreflective; power trickling down his spine and something huge shouldering its way up from the depths of the astral plane.

"Zelgadis?" Xellos prompted.

Xellos's hands had burned even through his gloves as he reached forward, snarling, strong fingers wrapping around Zelgadis's neck, black energy roiling and swirling around both of them. The sudden, violent potential in the tensed lines of their bodies thrummed like thunder through the air between them.

Zelgadis hadn't even fought. He'd blinked, and stumbled dizzily forward into Xellos, who jerked his hands away like Zelgadis was the one whose skin burned.

"You were going to kill me."

"Why didn't I?" he sounded curious but not terribly horrified.

"I don't know. It gets very… confused," Zelgadis decided.

"Confused."

"It's like… there was all this aggressive energy," he blinked his eyes open, "and then it… changed."

Xellos was frowning at him from much closer than he remembered him being. He could see the darker violet flecks in his eyes. "You're not making very much sense just yet," he sighed. "You mean to say that the initial purpose of the spell was to have me kill you?"

Zelgadis closed his eyes against the bright light reflected on the gemstone atop Xellos's staff. "I think so," he said. "But what would be the point of that?"

"Juu-ou-sama would kill Lina," Xellos said dryly, "right after she'd wrung my guts out for killing one of her friends. I could think of any number of people to whom that would seem like a good idea."

Zelgadis groaned. "What kinds of whackos come up with these warped plans and bother to sit there and plot them all out?"

"Mazoku _do_ have a lot of time on their hands," Xellos pointed out. "Go on."

"There's not much else. The energy changed." He swallowed. "We had sex," he ground out, blushing despite how sick he felt.

He definitely remembered the sex.

He'd arched, pressed between the hard ground and Xellos's body. He sealed their lips together, cut his tongue on his teeth, and pulled him closer, closer, closer. He could feel the shudders through Xellos's arms and shoulders; the hot hands on the curve of his backside tightened with tremors.

"Yes," he'd breathed in a shaking exhalation burying his face in Xellos's neck. He used his grip on his shoulders as leverage and hooked his legs around the taller man's waist.

The heat in his skin felt unstable, anxious and tingling, like a spell gone unbalanced. He relished it, arched and pulled harder and breathed in time with the frantic jerk of Xellos's hips against his.

His blistering grip convulsed, strong enough to split his skin. Zelgadis swallowed and breathed. In, out, in. He sliced Xellos's lips open in a kiss. The only noise Xellos made was with his shaking breath; the hypnotic shift and stretch of his body sparked delighted anxiety like a coiled snake in Zelgadis's gut.

"_Closer_," he'd ground out, fingers sliding over sweat-slicked skin and hair, coarse and shiny and stuck to his skin, breathing deeply the faint tang of blood, and he'd tossed his head back and cracked it against the ground, his vision dissolving in sparks and clutched him closer, clawing up his shoulder and feeling the electric burn of black magic spark up his spine.

He swallowed. Perhaps Xellos would mistake it for a fever flush.

"You know the rest," he said flatly.

Xellos did not take that prime opportunity to tease him. That was perhaps the most terrifying indication of how concerning the situation was. "There was nothing you can remember that," he searched for a word, "catalysed this?"

Zelgadis heaved a sigh. "My head hurts. Can we talk about this later?"

Xellos touched his head, an oddly tentative gesture. "Just try," he coaxed, playing with a few strands of hair, his lips quirking as they pinged back into place.

He sighed again. "The river," he said after a pause. "The river was turning a strange colour, but I didn't notice because it happened as the light changed and I felt sick to begin with. My reflection in it changed after everything went… different. You said we had to leave."

Xellos was frowning. He said something, but Zelgadis had fallen asleep. Later, he would be mortified that he'd found Xellos's touch comforting, but right then he felt comfortable.

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Many kisses for the nice reviewers. Tell me, did we like the chapter? I don't write smut, even of that soft-core level, very often. If you have any feedback on that for me, please review! I would like to know if I should leave some of that stuff in, or if I should just do a fade-to-black in later chapters.

Yes. Later chapters. )

Wish me luck on my exams! They start in three days, so I don't know why I'm procrastinating here! O.o


	7. The Smoke

See first chapter for disclaimer.

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It had been a week. Lina, Amelia and Gourry had wandered around the outside of Ferious, hunting for Zelgadis, but had come up empty-handed.

"Don't worry so much," Lina said dismissively, although neither of them had said they were particularly worried, "Zel's just run off on his own again. He can take care of himself!"

"Right," Amelia agreed. "What could possibly happen to Zelgadis?"

Nobody answered that. They had, after all, run into three of the warrior-priests of Ferious in the past week. Each of them had challenged Lina on sight, which was a fair indication that her description had been handed out after the Dragon Slave Incident that blew away a small portion of the city. And they'd been just as difficult to get rid of as a low-level Mazoku. Nobody doubted Zelgadis's ability, but if several teamed up against him at once, and he was wandering around without backup…

Lina sighed. "Come on. Think. If you were Zelgadis, and you were moping, where would you be?"

Gourry frowned as though thinking hard. Amelia stared blankly out through the dreary, drizzling forest. Trees and rocks abounded, and the pathway out of Ferious bent and twisted at odd places over little rises and falls in the land.

"A library?" Xellos suggested from just over her shoulder.

She leapt into the air with an undignified, "EEK!"

"Oh… did I startle you?" he cocked his head.

"Xellos! Where have you been?" Lina waved one hand expressively.

"You know, you'd think you'd get sick of asking," Xellos commented, looking concerned.

"Have we asked before?" Gourry wondered.

"It doesn't matter!" Lina said. "Where's Zelgadis?"

Xellos gave them a considering look for a second, as though wondering how much truth would be just enough to confuse them into believing the exact opposite to what was actually the truth.

Lina's eyes narrowed.

"He's… indisposed," Xellos settled on finally. Lina raised one eyebrow slowly. It was a word she'd heard before, usually in the priesthood or the nobility – 'indisposed' being a polite term for all sorts of things from the onset of mouth-frothing madness to a mild toothache.

She glowered. "What the hell does _indisposed_ mean?" she demanded, grabbing Xellos by his collar and shaking him. The red gems in his cloak caught the light strangely, never in the place she expected.

He cringed. "He's come down with something! Nausea, paralysis, so on, so on. Bad fever. I put him somewhere safe, though!" he added brightly.

"Well, you can just bring him back," Lina growled, letting abruptly go of his collar so he stumbled back, "so we can cast a healing spell and be on our way!"

Xellos straightened his cloak. "Really, Lina. I am a priest. If it could be healed normally, I'd have done it already," he frowned and leaned in closer when she looked like commencing further aggressive protests. "Truthfully, it's possible that whoever attacked us has also made some attempt on Zelgadis-san's health. Isn't it better that he's safe and sound rather than being dragged around by us?" he beamed.

Lina glared at him suspiciously. She wasn't sure exactly what he was up to, but she knew he was up to something. Xellos always was, and he rarely did anything with only one motive. But, short of battling a powerful Mazoku to get to Zelgadis, who, given Xellos's track record in dealing with them, was unlikely to be in _serious_ danger just yet, there was nothing she could do about it.

"Fine. But if anything happens to him –" she made a suggestive motion.

Xellos's cringe became slightly more realistic. "Ah, yes, Lina-san, I understand," he said, sweating.

"Demon!" Somebody screamed. The whole party jumped, even Xellos, as a black-clad priest appeared over the next rise, followed by another, then another.

"Oh, for…" Lina drew in a deep breath. "Amelia!" She snapped. Amelia's shield spell exploded into dazzling existence just in time, a blinding wall of pure white that prevented any attack magic from entering.

Gourry raced through it, calling out the incantation for his sword and slicing through one of the priests' arms, but the man next to him said a single short word that sent Gourry flying and calmly began the business of healing his companion's arm. Of course, this period of time, along with Gourry's distraction and Amelia's shielding, was all Lina needed to cast another dragon slave.

One of the priests, recognising his doom in Lina's glowing red eyes, noticed Xellos and raised a hand in supplication. "Brother!"

Xellos waved cutely, then cracked one eye open.

The forest exploded in light, sound and, for the priests, pain. At least it was fast, Lina reflected, but sometimes she wished it didn't make her so traceable – giant craters left a very sure trail.

--------------------------------

When Zelgadis woke up, he became aware of three things very quickly: One, he could not move so much as an eyelid. Two, it was dark enough that even he had difficulty seeing, although there was faint moonlight. Three, he could hear bats.

From this, Zelgadis deduced that he was in a cave.

He tried to scream Xellos's name in complete outrage, but it came out more like an incoherent snarl, as he could not move his lips.

Nobody answered. He continued struggling to move for the better part of an hour. Mind over matter, he reminded himself that he was a damn good shaman and he could _make_ his body move. He had a more difficult time of convincing his body of this, because his magic felt… numb, somehow. Clumsy.

"Ah! Zelgadis, you're awake!"

Zelgadis glared as Xellos's silhouette glided from the darkest shadows into the dubious moonlight. He was smiling like all was well with the world again. "I hadn't expected you to have such a strong constitution."

Zelgadis continued to glare.

Xellos's smile became slightly strained. "Oh." He touched his forehead with one finger as he sweatdropped. "Well, I guess maybe you don't." He dropped to a crouch next to Zelgadis's supine body, knees tucked together, and prodded him in the ribs. "Does that hurt?"

Zelgadis made a strange noise, half growling and half… something else. Xellos's smile widened suddenly. "Oh, my," he murmured, and did it again. "So, does _that_ hurt?" he asked.

He was glad he didn't have much leeway for reaction. He wasn't _that _ticklish, but he didn't like being prodded. He did not have much choice, presently, so he settled for making threatening noises as best he could. Xellos did not seem the slightest bit phased by them, however.

Zelgadis continued to stare upwards, feel nauseous, and wonder what had possessed him, even drugged or possessed, to sleep with this idiot.

Slowly, he could feel the paralysis wearing off. He gave no indication, carefully not even twitching as Xellos continued with his prodding, occasionally stopping to ask Zelgadis if he was really ticklish or if he was just teasing.

Zelgadis found that he had a slight problem with looking at the Mazoku priest when he spoke. He couldn't seem to look at his face, or his long, dexterous fingers as they flicked lightly over his ribs, without remembering – well, things that he was sure had been better left forgotten.

Things that reminded him of that unstable heat rising just under his skin, the tingling anxiety in his gut and the delicious tension in his body as he'd arched and clawed against Xellos.

Damn the Beastmaster and her drugged chocolate cookies, anyway.

He considered it a form of post traumatic stress disorder. That caused flashbacks to traumatic events, didn't it? He nodded internally. Externally, he kept an eye on Xellos's movements.

When he felt his body was maneuverable, he pounced. Then he realized that he was in mid-air, and his body had ceased to work, paralysed again. He was going to fall.

"Zelgadis-san! I didn't know you had it in you! Am I blushing?"

Or not.

Xellos hooked his arm under his knees and scooped him up as though he wasn't about two hundred pounds of boneless rock.

Then he bit him.

Zelgadis hadn't actually been aware that his neck was all that sensitive before. He had gathered, as a general kind of concept, that having something jammed into it was unpleasant, but it had not occurred to him that feeling someone's tongue slide along the skin between jagged pieces of rock would…

– _Make him arch into the touch, hands scrambling for purchase across his back; his head tilted back, throat bared to – _

…make him forget that it was Xellos for more than a microsecond.

Zelgadis struggled feebly.

Xellos tilted his head back and eyed him from behind hooded purple eyes. "Well, you are, at any rate," he said, sounding satisfied about something, and tossed Zelgadis over his shoulder. "The poison's wearing off. You'll be on your feet again in a day or two." 

"And…" Zelgadis croaked, almost surprised that he could get a slow sentence out. His tongue felt like liquid. "What am I supposed to do between now and then? Where am I?" 

"You're safe enough here. From outside forces, anyway," Xellos added after a moment's thought. "Well, at least until nightfall." 

Zelgadis saw the ground as they stepped out from the cave. The dirt was not the right colour. The moonlight leached all colour from the world, dyeing it a bleak place of black and white, but what he saw was… barren. 

"Where. Am. I?" Pale, cracked earth spread as far as he could see from his slump across Xellos's shoulder. Here and there spindly, black plants clawed their way to survival, scattered like twisted tendrils of smoke in a foul breeze.

Xellos's grin was audible.

Zelgadis did not think he really needed the answer. It was sort of obvious from the barren earth and the screaming wolves. He had to get out of there. Just as soon as Xellos left him alone.

"Where are we going?"

"My place," Xellos said.

"Your place?" Zelgadis repeated. Zelgadis wasn't certain, but he didn't sound as though it was a terribly welcome intrusion.

Xellos didn't respond. The world blurred around them for a second, looking like nothing so much as coloured dye inside a blender, and then they were back on solid ground. As solid as it needed to be, anyway.

Zelgadis found himself tossed onto a bed like a human-shaped sandbag. Xellos looked down at him with his smiling non-expression unreadable. "You should be fine here."

He waved once and left.

Zelgadis wasn't sure what was more surprising: that he hadn't made a single annoying quip or risqué comment, or that he'd actually turned around and left when Zelgadis was essentially at his mercy.

He strained to lift his head and glanced around. There was no discernable light source, but he could see just fine – the bed he was on stood out against the black nothingness of everything else like a beacon. He frowned and struggled to peer over the edge. He could have been moving and he wouldn't have known it, because the bed was his only point of reference.

He struggled to roll back over before he made himself sick.

"What is it?" someone whispered.

"Hush," another snapped. "It's sick. Leave it be, or you'll catch something."

Zelgadis blinked. "Who's there?" he growled, but he had a sinking feeling he knew. Trust Xellos to leave him in a creepy world with a bunch of Mazoku with nothing more than, 'You should be fine' and a wave. _Asshole_.

He heard something clicking across the floor. A horned head appeared over the foot of the bed. As far as he could tell, it was some kind of canine – with horns, a mane, electric blue fur and positively wicked teeth.

"It's awake." Its voice did not match the mouth that made the noises. It was a refined, educated voice with no trace of a growl or an accent. In fact, if Zelgadis looked, he couldn't even see its mouth moving. Psychic, perhaps. Or maybe it was a bit like how Xellos and Rezo had always been able to navigate without using their eyes.

"We knew that, idiot," Other shapes formed out of the darkness. Some of them were very large. "What is it?"

"I believe," the doglike critter said, "That it is some kind of chimera." It sniffed. "Human stock. Demon on the astral plane. Interesting spell, really." He, for the voice was definitely male, paused. "I'd love to unwind it and see how it was done."

Zelgadis bared his teeth and growled low.

"Better not," one of the other voices rumbled. "Xel'll gut you."

"Hmmm. Does it speak?" the blue-furred creature bounded nimbly to the covers. It wasn't much bigger than a large dog, probably only waist-high when standing, but it was still plenty big enough.

Zelgadis took comfort in the fact that his teeth wouldn't pierce his skin. Almost definitely. He looked again. Initially. "I speak. What the hell are you?"

"Mazoku."

"Do you think it's edible?"

"Xel'll gut you, too. Think it's worth it?"

"Depends on the taste."

Zelgadis closed his eyes. It was just not his week.

-------------------------------- 

Night fell. The inn was silent; Lina and Gourry had arrive early enough that they'd finished eating before midnight. Now that it was quiet, Amelia was free to mope on her own.

She should have been tired, and she was, but it wasn't the sort of tired that allowed her to sleep.

She was drinking water, but she'd asked for a glass of wine earlier, and sipped slowly at it, so she didn't feel like she was taking up space at the bar without paying. She wasn't sure why she'd bothered; the place was empty.

It wasn't that she missed Zelgadis – they had certainly all survived without one another over the years – and it wasn't that she didn't trust Xellos – well, she didn't _trust_ Xellos, exactly, but she felt, in some peculiar way, that he was reliably untrustworthy, and would not change the pattern that they'd all gotten used to – but she felt unsettled about the whole thing.

"Poor Zelgadis," she sighed, thinking of him alone and unwell somewhere.

"Oh, he'll be fine," Xellos said brightly, and she almost jumped out of her skin.

"Sneaking up on me like that -- that's not fair," she grumbled. "Couldn't you ring a bell, or something?" she added.

"I could," Xellos shrugged, stealing her wine. She hadn't wanted it to begin with, so she didn't bother pointing out how rude that was "But that would defeat the purpose of sneaking up, don't you think? Ah, what a delightful vintage."

Amelia wasn't certain if he was being sarcastic, or if he actually couldn't taste the wine. She didn't comment. She felt uneasy alone with Xellos, past midnight, with nobody awake to help her.

She frowned and rubbed her head. Did she expect something to go wrong here? Xellos to up and start strangling her for no apparent reason? Perhaps she was coming down with something. She did feel a bit peculiar; somehow fevered.

She took a sip of her water and frowned at the taste. It was slowly going dark. She blinked at it. "Did you do that?"

"Hmm?" Xellos's smiling eyes turned towards her, followed her gaze, and snapped open. He suddenly looked very alien with purple cat's eyes. It seemed to change the whole structure of his face to something subtly inhuman.

Amelia swallowed as the black magic of his energy buzzed down her spine.

"Well now, that is tricky," he murmured. He reached for the glass.

Amelia threw it in his face. "Get away from me," she said in a low voice.

Xellos blinked. "Amelia?"

Her chair clattered to the floor as she scrambled away, hands low as she mumbled a spell. Her own magic felt clean and pure as it washed over her.

"_Rah Tilt!_"

-------------------------------- 

It was a bit of a patchy chapter – I wrote different pieces of it at different times. The next chapter involves the shit hitting the fan [more!, for more characters than you'd think. Hope you stay tuned!

Criticism and comments and all offers of candy are encouraged [especially the candy.


	8. The Water

See first chapter for disclaimer.

--

"_Rah Tilt!_"Amelia's hands were shaking, dark veins showing bright on pale skin. The spell was not her best, but it still packed quite a punch.

"Amelia-sa – Yeeek!" Xellos yelped, but the attack did little more than sting. The small girl threw her chair at him, voice cracking with panic, and scrambled away. He might have let it hit him under other circumstances, but something was definitely wrong with her. Being cute and disarming wasn't going to get him anywhere.

Even the cocktail of her distress seemed risky, he realised, distancing himself. She felt heavy, somehow, drunk or drugged or poisonous, perhaps. And warm.

Behind the bar, the innkeeper was wringing his hands and chewing his lip but wisely remaining outside of striking range. He backed up until his back was to a discreet exit, and then slunk away through it. Probably to get help.

Xellos had more immediate problems. "Get away from me!" Amelia shrieked, followed by a frightened, "_Elmekia Lance!_"

"Amelia-san," Xellos shifted in and out of physical reality with a swift bluy and snatched her wrist, pressing her against the bar and holding her there with superior force. She stared at him with wide, unblinking eyes for half a second, and then tipped her head back, took a deep breath, and _screamed. _

Amelia had a very impressive voice.

Lina's angry, sleep-deprived mutterings sounded above them, as well as the tell-tale _thwack_ of Gourry being woken.

Xellos held Amelia immobile for a moment, long fingers wrapped around her wrists. He was not particularly concerned that she was still screaming, her breath coming in jagged pants. But she was warm, too warm for a human, he suspected, and he frowned at her eyes. Her pupils were enormous.

"Xellos..." Lina's angry growl behind him made him wince. He didn't bother turning a look over his shoulder. He had a general idea what he'd find: Lina's crimson eyes narrowed to maddened slits, fists clenched, black magic rumbling in the depths of her mind – "What the hell do you think you're doing?"

"Let Amelia go," Gourry's voice was equally serious.

Xellos considered his options. He let Amelia go. She fell, sobbing to the floor. He backed away a step. Another. Slowly now. Bad idea to frighten Lina into action. Collected the glass from where it had rolled, the black liquid still thick on its sides. Then he burst into motion and disappeared with a wave and a swish of his cloak.

Gourry and Lina rushed to Amelia's side. "Amelia!" Lina dropped to her knees beside the girl. "Amelia, what happened? What did he do to you?"

Amelia stared blankly ahead for a few long minutes, perhaps as many as five. "I..." she frowned, exhaling a shaking breath. "Nothing?"

Lina and Gourry shared a look over her head, for once in perfect understanding – they were _both_ confused. Lina puffed out a breath and ran a hand through her hair. She'd left her gloves up by her bed, and her hands were very pale. "Okay. Start from the beginning. When did Xellos get here?"

Amelia shook her head. "Not that long ago. Minutes."

"And then what?"

"I was worried about Zelgadis-san. He said he'd be fine. And then..." she frowned. "I'm not so sure," she admitted. "What happened?" she wondered.

Lina tugged on her hair, sympathy quickly turning to impatience. "That's what we're asking you!"

Amelia blinked up at her. "Lina! Did I wake you? I'm sorry... I don't know what came over me. I was just going to bed," she shook her head and stood up.

"Wait, Amelia," Lina grabbed her arm. "What happened with Xellos?"

She blinked. "Xellos-san?" she frowned. "I haven't seen him for a while. Why? Is he up to something? I sure hope Zelgadis-san's okay..."

Lina dropped her arm, and watched toddle off to bed silently. "Amelia..."

Gourry scratched his head. "Is it just me, or was she really out of it? I mean... she's _always _kind of strange, but –"

"Yeah," Lina sighed. "And you know it's bad if _you _can tell."

Gourry nodded sagely. Then he stopped. "What are we going to do?"

Her red eyes narrowed. "I think we need to have a chat with Xellos," she growled.

--

The room had changed upon her whim again. The fluted columns, pointed gothic arches, impossibly high ceilings; they appeared because she willed it with her most idle thought. This was her domain, her home, and she was lord and master over all that she surveyed.

Xellas lounged upon a satin-covered, cushion-strewn dais, her long blond hair pooling somewhere around her thighs, her long fingers tapping idly over her exposed skin, nails scraping up her hips, bangles jingling gently. She listened to her servant's report with half a mind. Her thoughts swirled, glistening like oil on water. She ran her tongue over her teeth.

"So, the gist is that some water-related compulsion spell took the pair of you by surprise, and you almost killed the chimera, but ended up having sex instead," she murmured, fingertips sliding over her ribs pensively. She stretched her long body, and resettled with a contented sigh.

"Yes," Xellos agreed without a trace of embarrassment.

"A bizarre turn." She paused. "But I suppose it would be easy to turn the energy of water to lust, if you did redirect the spell. Easier still, if it was him," she considered with a sliver of a smile. "And then the younger shaman attacked you after the water in her glass also... changed?" she gestured languidly with one bangle-strewn hand to indicate the lack of appropriate word.

"Indeed," he inclined his head.

"Have you analysed the glass, and the residue?"

"Not as fully as I would like," he admitted. "Although the spell does seem to be one of discord, and very similar to the workings of Dolphin," he went on. "But it isn't certain."

"What is?" She laughed, a smoky croon in the dimness. She lost herself in thought for a moment more. "Interesting," she exhaled a plume of smoke and sucked in a deeper breath. Her half-lidded eyes, dark and glittering, fell upon him with a considering gaze. "Xellos?"

He raised his eyes to her face, so perfectly beautiful that it was strange and alien.

"Was he any good?" she asked curiously.

"I'm curious about that as well, now," he said with a cheerfully wicked half-smile, "but I'm afraid I don't remember."

She yawned, flashing perfect white teeth. "I suppose that answers my question," she sighed. She waved one hand at him. "You'd best make sure he's still breathing. And perhaps pay a visit to Dolphin," she added darkly.

Anybody would have reservations about sitting down with a mad Mazoku lord for a nice, friendly chat about whether or not she was making a political menace of herself. There was no civility lost between Dolphin and Xellas, either. But Xellos just nodded and stood.

The Beastmaster's lips twisted into the bright smile on the edge of a dagger as he turned away. "Xellos," she halted him with barely a breath. "Why don't you take Lina-san along?"

"What a wonderful idea." She could feel his smile.

He left, and she leaned back, watching the smoke from her cigarette warp in the air. It wouldn't do to lose her favourite minion to her sister's flights of fancy, after all. "And Lina is such a nice girl, after all," she mused in her languid haze, stretching her fingers out to catch the smoke. It came to her like a pet, wreathing her arm. "All you have to do is give her a nudge in the right direction sometimes."

Provided, of course, that 'the right direction' was the general direction of some other Mazoku lord. The Beastmaster herself was determined to be smarter than her brothers had.

--

Zelgadis could sit up. He couldn't quite control his legs and feet yet, but his hands, arms and torso were fine, and he could certainly _feel_ his lower extremities. He considered this progress.

The majority of the Mazoku around him had become disinterested over the passage of several hours during which he lay there motionless. Except for the odd doglike one. He seemed to be there to stay. After an indeterminate period of time, he hopped up onto the bed and stretched out like a massive, shaggy, blue throw rug.

"What are you here for, anyway?" he asked sleepily.

Zelgadis glared at him. "I have no idea."

He blinked one large eye. The slitted pupil widened momentarily, and then thinned down again. "What do you suspect?"

"That Xellos enjoys tormenting me."

There was a pause. "Uh-huh. I meant 'what are you here for' in a less existential sense," the Mazoku corrected delicately, yawning and flashing row upon row of dangerous teeth.

Zelgadis growled, and figured that he must have made it to hell.

Without warning, Xellos bounced on the bed next to him. The springs squeaked. The dog-Mazoku shifted to make room. "Hi, Zelgadis-san," he said with no preamble. "Legs working yet?"

Zelgadis turned his baleful glare on him, but tried to move his leg. To his surprise, it was responsive. "Enough," he said slowly.

"Good, good." He smiled brightly, and tugged him out of bed with surprising strength.

Zelgadis stumbled, but refused to use the stupid smiling priest for balance. He straightened on his own feet and continued glaring. "What are you going to do to me now?" he growled.

"Do to you?" Xellos feigned innocence. "Why, you make me sound like some heinous monster," he pouted, touching one hand to his chest to still his pounding heart. Which, Zelgadis reminded himself, he did not actually have. "I just want you to take a look at something for me."

"What is it?" Zelgadis found himself tugged along. He jerked his arm away from Xellos's grip, but followed on his own. There was no point in being uncooperative when he was stuck in the Mazoku's home. Probably. He still had no idea where he really was.

"Something relevant," Xellos tugged on his wrist again, spinning them through dizzying space with no reference point for the feeling of speed and movement. Zelgadis's stomach roiled.

Xellos held something up in front of his face. It was a cracked glass, coated in something thick and dark and... recognisable.

"That's the same..." He frowned, but gamely reached out to touch it. As soon as his stone fingertips brushed the gunk on the glass, Xellos snatched it away and dropped it on the far side of the desk.

Zelgadis swallowed. His head span. He blinked at Xellos, whose mouth was moving, making noises, but – they were strung together in meaningless ways, nonsense syllables, or the complicated syntax of an unknown language.

The other man's eyes were open, his fingers freezing on Zelgadis's neck, tilting his chin back. His words reached him for a second, "...the same as in the memory?"

"Well, you're not trying to kill me," Zelgadis tried to say, but the words turned sideways on him and cracked on his tongue, dripping from his lips and pouring down his chin. His eyes rolled back in his head.

When he could see again, the dog-Mazoku was flopped over his legs, and Xellos was checking his pupils with a delighted smile.

Zelgadis just groaned. He was pretty sure that all of these hallucinations and blank periods in his memory weren't good for him, or his life expectancy. His head felt like somebody had shattered a window in there.

"Still intact?" Xellos asked cheerfully.

Zelgadis stared at him. "Yes," he said finally, slowly, the words molasses on his leaden tongue.

"Looks like I was right, more or less. A spell in the water, one to sow confusion and discord. Only strong while you're near the water. Doesn't work very well on you," he added with a smirk, "since your unique combination of brau demon and golem make you fairly impenetrable on either plane."

Zelgadis nodded, but wondered idly, tiredly, what the hell the spell would do to someone who _wasn't_ 'impenetrable' on either plane.

Xellos beamed at him. "Go to sleep," he suggested, imbuing the words with the tiniest bit of power.

Zelgadis dropped.

"Lightweight," mumbled the dog-Mazoku.

--

Amelia stared, wide-eyed and frightened, out at the rain cascading down her window. It came in thick, black streaks, and leaked through the edges of the wooden frame to slither across her floor like satiny black ribbons, meandering closer.

--

What do you think? Reviews reeeeally welcome.


	9. The Stakes

See first chapter for disclaimer

--

"The spell is _intended_ to result in complete possession of the person it's used against," Xellos was saying, beaming at Zelgadis from where he sat, cross-legged on the bright bedspread. "Which explains the memory loss, of course," he added, almost to himself. "But it's also been pretty clumsily employed, and doesn't seem to work correctly with your freakish physiology," he went on.

_Freakish._ Zelgadis mustered all of his energy and scowled fiercely at the idiot priest. His head pounded. Tension sang down his shoulders and neck. He felt restless, exhausted and nauseated by turns, and a persistent anxiety was gnawing steadily into his gut.

While some of the symptoms may have been related to his recent experiences with mind-altering and arcane substances, he could pinpoint the source of the anxiety precisely.

Xellos was sharing information.

Sure, it didn't make much sense while thoughts were sloshing against the walls of his skull like the inside of a blender on high speed, but it served as a clear indication that something was wrong with the natural order. "_Not_ freakish," he muttered, holding his head and struggling to understand.

"My, and here I thought you'd be offended if I tried to downplay your abnormality! I'd never try to win you over with false assurances, Zel-kun, but it seems that you're a very suspicious person!" He gave that same irritating laugh and tilted his head to the side, smile broadening. "But, at any rate, I wouldn't think the spell should have full effect on anybody but a human," he shrugged. "All that's left is to trace it back to its originator!"

"You _bastard_," Zelgadis was too busy with his resentful snarling to listen to anything relevant just then. He groped for his sword, came up empty handed and began readying a spell instead. "As though _you _would have any idea what it's like –!"

A bright lance of pain spiked through his brainstem, obscuring his vision in a sparkling haze. He gasped for breath and lunged to snatch at Xellos's cloak, choking out heated, hateful words – _reviled by your own – hated – suspected – perverse creature –_

They flowed on and on and on, and Xellos did not stop smiling, even as his strong stone fingers dug into his skin. Zelgadis's vision went red at the edges with exhaustion and rage. He lost himself to it for some time before Xellos, eyes glazed and languid with something like ecstasy, murmured cheerfully,

"Ah, did I mention that Amelia-san drank some of that enchanted water?"

It took a few seconds for that to permeate the haze in Zelgadis's head. He stopped, shaking. "What?" he asked softly.

"Well, I was just thinking," Xellos said, far too slowly, and cocked his head with a thoughtful little smile, "the spell might have a full effect on Amelia-san. I thought I had sufficiently interrupted it, but she would be weak to it, and since I came back here to experiment on your lovely body, and Lina-san doesn't know…"

Zelgadis scrambled off the bed and snatched up his sword, stumbling against an invisible wall made of black nothing in the process.

"Eh? Ah, Zelgadis-san?" Xellos said mildly.

His voice snapped. "What?"

"Where do you think you're going?" He was much closer, purple bangs sliding over his face, eyes still locked into a smile. Not for the first time, Zelgadis reflected that Xellos's only use for the concept of 'personal space' was so he could violate it at whim.

"Xellos!" He growled. "This isn't the time! We've got to –"

"By all means, Zelgadis-san," he gestured around at their delightful slice of nothingness.

Zelgadis understood what he was getting at almost immediately. He frowned at the grinning priest. "What do you want? We've got to make sure Amelia's okay," he said in his most reasonable voice, calm and measured and not at all as though he was about to fly completely off the handle.

"What do I want…?" Xellos hummed thoughtfully. He took his time. His annoying smile scraped Zelgadis's fragile nerves with all the delicacy of nails on a chalkboard.

"I know!" He said finally, beaming yet brighter. "A kiss!"

If the walls of Zelgadis's skull were anything like a high-speed blender, Xellos had just removed the lid. For a few long, incredulous seconds, he wasn't quite sure _how_ to react. Thoughts flickered in his head and were snuffed out, some outraged, some disturbed, some outraged and disturbed at how little the idea outraged and disturbed him --

He considered violence. Then he considered how often violence didn't work with Xellos. Then he considered getting pissed off and embarrassed, but he knew that that would only make him happy. So he refused to feel anything except confused and vaguely irritated and stared Xellos down. "No."

There is the kind of no that can be worn down to a grudging yes, and then there is NO.

Xellos, naturally, did not believe in the second kind.

"Pity," he said, smirking and folding himself back onto the bed. "I'm pretty sure it was about to rain again when I left. It's not as though it ever _stops_ raining in that valley, though," he added with feigned annoyance. "But positive atmospheric interference _would_ increase the magical potential of that water-based spell… oh, tenfold, perhaps."

Xellos tossed back his head and laughed again. "Why, even Lina-san's willpower would be worn down by that kind of interference! Hahaha!"

Zelgadis tightened his grip on the hilt of his sword. "I thought Mazoku prided themselves on being subtle," he muttered.

Xellos raised one eyebrow, managing to look appropriately dubious despite having both eyes (ostensibly) closed. Any argument he might make against Zelgadis's criticism would be detrimental to getting what he wanted. "You caught me," he murmured with a sweet little smile. "I really just wanted a kiss, since I can't remember."

Zelgadis frowned, now absolutely positive that, not only was Xellos trying to extort a kiss out of him, but that he had another motive for doing it – one that wasn't based on Zelgadis's irritation and humiliation. But he knew Xellos to be quite capable of letting something terrible happen to Amelia while coaxing Zelgadis into doing what he wanted – which, knowing Xellos, he would likely get some other way anyway.

But he didn't for a moment believe that Lina was likely to succumb to a spell that overrode willpower, whatever its demonic nature or power.

Unfortunately, she wouldn't know where to start looking for a solution, either. And he _did_ believe that Gourry would succumb. Perhaps he wouldn't hurt Lina or Amelia directly, but there were hundreds, thousands of other ways –

Come to think of it, though, Zelgadis didn't know where to start, either. He clenched his jaw and leveled a glare at Xellos. The Mazoku held up his hands in a placating gesture, mocking because Zelgadis's ultimate ability to harm him was next to zero while they were in Xellos's domain. In fact, he was pretty much helpless.

"A kiss," he ground out.

"Just a kiss, Zelgadis-san. It's not as though I'm asking for your virginity, is it?"

Zelgadis flushed and tried not to think about that. The sudden hike of Xellos's left eyebrow was accompanied by an indrawn breath, a hand touched delicately to his heart and the subtle widening of his smirk.

"A _kiss_," Zelgadis repeated to get them back on track.

Xellos humoured him, lips curving into a different smile. "Mmm-hmm," he hummed.

"And you'll take me to them, and help us figure out how to stay out from under the influence of this… spell?" he asked, staring suspiciously through his wiry bangs.

Xellos spread his hands innocently. "Of course, Zelgadis-san." His intention hadn't been so overt, but it didn't countermand any of his other objectives. And he could legitimately moan that Zelgadis had tricked him into it, if questioned. He batted his eyelashes.

"And you're going to help us figure out who the hell is doing this?" he prompted.

A more difficult request. Xellos was not inclined to share _all_ of his information on _any_ given subject. "Am I not?" He asked, instead of answering.

"Fine." Zelgadis licked his lips. Then he paused. "And you're going to do all of this immediately?"

"Of _course_, Zelgadis-san," Xellos sighed. "Now, if the proper negotiations have been conducted to your approval?" he asked, rocking to his feet.

The moisture evaporated from his mouth and throat. Zelgadis took a step back. His back hit the wall of nothing. It was closer now. Xellos probably controlled the whole space. Thank god that wasn't a disturbing thought or anything.

Xellos's smile was far more sincere now, the smile on the edge of a knife blade; a thin sliver of mockery, amusement and – hunger. Zelgadis could feel it vibrating in the air, something thick and dark and hungry under the skin, pure negativity given shape and purpose.

Xellos's hot fingers slid over the stone skin of his throat, flexing – was he tempted to press down, to crush? – almost too hot to stand. Gut-deep anxiety had a dull burn. Xellos's lips were hot, too hot, sliding over his mouth.

Their bodies pressed together, Xellos's hands carefully on his shoulders, no further movements. He didn't need them. Zelgadis steadied himself. It was just a kiss. Just. A. Kiss.

Pure negativity, thick and black and chaotic, vibrated along his bones.

He withdrew. His smile was as vulpine and false as it ever was, his eyes twisted shut. Zelgadis closed his eyes, unable to reconcile the reckless heat with –

He exhaled.

"Here we are!" Xellos's obnoxious voice crowed somewhere in his ear.

Zelgadis opened his eyes and – there they were. The room at the inn was fairly standard, as far as inns went: wooden bed, bedside table, cheap chest of drawers. It was impersonal but tidy, aside from the sticky mess of blackened 'water' across the floor.

On the shredded sheets, Amelia crouched, her eyes wide and alien. She had misplaced her shirt, and, although he should have averted his eyes, Zelgadis stared at her. Her skin was soft, clean, creamy looking. The lily-white curves of her hips became a narrow waist and swelled into rounded, tender-looking breasts, nipples hard from the chill air. Later, perhaps, he would cite his concern for all the bruising, abrasions and occasional gashes, but if he was completely honest, he was just thinking –

"My, how does she keep all of that in her shirt?" Xellos commented, cheerfully lecherous.

Zelgadis winced, but recovered quickly enough to turn to snarl at him – which was when Amelia tackled him.

She leapt, arms outstretched, face contorted, snarling, and crashed into him, pulling him to the floor with her in a pile of smooth, curvy flesh and solid rock.

The rock won. Zelgadis distinctly heard the crack of one of her ribs when he landed on top of her, but she didn't even seem to notice. She pounded on his impenetrable skin with frantic fists.

Xellos hauled her away from Zelgadis with a grip on one shoulder. He sniffed her experimentally. "Same thing," he confirmed.

"How do we get rid of it?"

Xellos shrugged one shoulder, holding her at arm's length so she didn't hit him. "Try a basic dispel curse?"

Zelgadis did. Amelia's skin lit up for a few seconds, but otherwise nothing happened. He shook his head.

"Maybe we should just put her somewhere safe for a while," he suggested after they paused, watching her writhe and thrash at the end of Xellos's arm. The marks on her skin showed a struggle, Zelgadis thought. Perhaps she'd tried to get rid of whatever had invaded her with pain. Anger stirred in his belly. Amelia was _his_ friend. She'd been vulnerable just because she was human, and now some asshole Mazoku had used that against her and twisted her into something –

He swallowed.

"Well, it worked with me."

Xellos nodded. "I can put her in the same place I had you," he considered. "The Dog will look after her. At least until he gets bored," he added.

Zelgadis nodded. "I'll find Lina."

Xellos nodded, gave him a cute wave, and disappeared with the thrashing princess.

Zelgadis stared at the spot he had occupied for a few long seconds. Amelia was in this state because her humanity made her vulnerable. Freak. He rubbed his forehead and tried not to remember kissing Xellos.

But it was hard. The physical sensations could not compare to the low, vibrating thrum that sang up his spine. Self-loathing. Guilt. Ego. Selfish, selfish lust. Xellos was a demon. It was the most human thing he had ever felt.

--

I wasn't going to post again so soon, but Xellos wanted to spend some two-thousand words manipulating Zelgadis through drugs, exhaustion and finally outright extortion. Into trading kisses. The original chapter nine was absolutely _brim-full_ of plot and action and is not in any way, shape or form just here for me to try to come up with a situation in which Zelgadis would reasonably trade in sexual favours. (Does a kiss count?)

So I cut down on the kissing and deliver possessed!Amelia instead.


	10. The Order

--

See first chapter for disclaimer!

_Chapter Ten, in which Zelgadis goes slowly crazy, Lina gets sort-of in the loop, Xellos confuses everybody, and Gourry is dumb.  
_

--

"Lina!" Zelgadis seemed just fine to her when he bolted around a corner and interrupted her midnight snack. She frowned at him over a chicken wing. He seemed flustered, and she could see white in his eyes, but he certainly seemed _healthy_ enough.

"Hi, Zelgadis!" She waved a drumstick cutely at him and continued stuffing her face.

He yanked on her arm, superior strength hauling her from her knees. "No time," he said over her protests, "we're in trouble. Come on!" He tugged her toward the door.

She blinked. "Slow down, Zel! Nice to see you, too."

"Amelia's been possessed. I left her with Xellos. Can you please _move_?" He tugged harder.

Lina came stumbling. She pulled her arm away from Zelgadis's cold grasp, but her serious expression was designed for action. "Get Gourry," she said, "we'll meet up in the common room of the inn in five."

"Right," Zelgadis nodded, and disappeared out the doorway to find Gourry's room; never a hard job, considering the snores.

Lina sighed. Then she looked back down at her plate.

"Who knows how long it'll be before I get another good meal?" she rationalised, snatching up most of the remaining chicken and jamming it into her mouth. She chewed once or twice, almost choked herself, and finally swallowed it all.

"And now Gourry can't get it, either," she grinned. Her smile faded. She took up her dagger and cloak, dressed herself as befitted a beautiful sorcery genius and went to find out what the hell was going on.

The stairs creaked and moaned under her footsteps, so when she entered the inn's common room the two people inside were already facing her. Zel looked more normal – chilly and irritated and doing a rather poor job of hiding his concern to anybody who actually knew him. Sometimes she wondered why he bothered anymore.

And Gourry was asleep again. She hit him. He blinked at her. "Oh, Lina." He said.

Her temper moved off at a simmer and she was just warming up to a really fine tantrum when Xellos shimmered into reality between Zel and Gourry. "She's sedated, but I don't know how to fix her yet," he said.

"_Sedated_?" Lina demanded. "What have you done to her? You attacked her earlier, and now she's possessed? Forgive me if I don't think this is much of a coincidence." Her eyes narrowed. "You're usually better at this sort of thing, Xellos. Losing your touch?"

"Maaa… Lina-san, isn't that exactly why you should believe me?" he scratched the back of his neck. "This _isn't_ how I would do it! If I wanted to kill Amelia…" all eyes fixed on him, glittering with impending doom. He seemed to realise he was surrounded. "…well, anyway. Good news! I don't want to kill Amelia!" He said hastily. "The truth is, I didn't attack her! She attacked me, which is why I suspect that she was already at least partially possessed."

Lina bit off her fast and furious retort at the last part of his explanation. "Already possessed…?" she frowned. "Ne, Gourry… didn't we think she was acting strange?"

"Huh?" he looked up from where he was crawling on the floor.

"What the hell are you doing down there?" Lina demanded, poising her boot for a sharp kick to the ribs.

He held up half a napkin. "The table was wobbly. See?" he pointed to where he'd slid the other half under one of the legs, and then he pushed at the table to demonstrate his awesome fixing-stuff abilities.

Lina growled. "Oh, whatever. So, who's behind it?" she demanded of Xellos.

"Well… the power's being channeled through water," he said.

"It is? How come I haven't seen it?" Lina glared at him, deeply suspicious.

"I have," Zelgadis volunteered.

She frowned at him. "And how do I know _you're_ not possessed?" She pointed out.

"That's a really good question!" Xellos said with an annoying laugh.

"And?" She raised an eyebrow.

"You don't!"

"Hey!" Zelgadis thumped him over the head with one stone fist. "I'm not possessed! We know the water spell doesn't like my physiology, so…"

Lina and Gourry were staring blankly at him.

"…but I can't really vouch for my source of information," he considered. "So I guess I really could be possessed. I don't _feel_ possessed, though," he added.

"Ah, Zelgadis-san, how do you know what possessed feels like?" Xellos queried.

Rezo, thought Lina. But the fact remained that Rezo, for all his faults, was never exactly a Mazoku. Well, not until he was, anyway. She shook her head of that confusing thought. Xellos was speaking, and there was the slimmest chance that it might actually be relevant this time.

"So, you see, I could really be tricking you all!" He finished.

No, not relevant. That he was admitting the possibility made Lina more likely to think that he _wasn't_ tricking them into something stupid. Then again, it was possible that he just wanted them to think that, but it was also possible that he foresaw _that_ line of thought and Lina was now up to her third hand in an argument with herself and she should probably have known better than to indulge in any horribly circular kind of thinking involving Xellos, because he usually one-upped her. Initially, at least.

"Fine. I believe you. Who is it?"

"Dolphin."

No guessing games? No misleading half-truths? Lina's eyes narrowed. "This is serious, huh. So what, are you going to set me up to kill Dynast next?" She grumbled.

"It's not _my_ fault that dark lords all want to kill you for one reason or other, you know," Xellos complained.

She didn't entirely believe that, but she shrugged. "Okay, so you think it's Dolphin. I guess that explains the water thing. But I have one question," she added, holding up a finger.

"Oh?" Xellos cocked his head, dark hair swinging around his collar like a demented sort of counterweight.

"How do you know that Zelgadis is unaffected?"

"The truth is, Zelgadis-san was affected, a bit, by the river in the town you stayed in two weeks ago. But it didn't work very well on him… although it induced amnesia. That's why we had to jog his memory!"

Lina's mind was only half on what Xellos was saying. Zelgadis's expression was more interesting – and more telling. He had turned a particularly impressive shade of magenta, and she _knew_ there was something they weren't telling her.

Then her brain caught up. "Jog…his…" She blinked. "THAT's where you've been!"

"What did you tell her?" Zelgadis hissed furiously.

"Eh… Zel, are you okay? Your face is kind of red…" Gourry wondered, lifting some bed-messy blond hair to peer at him.

"Eh? That you were sick. Which you were. Why, what did you _want_ me to tell her, Zel-chan?"

"Zel… chan…?" Zelgadis stopped looking angry. His head dropped, wiry hair shadowing his eyes. His shoulders shook.

"Zel—" Lina cautioned.

"Of course! Zel-chaaaaan," Xellos drew the word out for maximum annoyance.

Lina tugged Gourry out of the line of fire surreptitiously but quickly. They almost made it out of the inn before it was a smouldering pile of ashes and wood chips. Almost.

"ZEL!" Lina shrieked, blasting some rubble away and dragging Gourry out with her. They were soot-stained and very annoyed. "What the hell is the idea with –" She stopped.

Xellos shifted back into the room, completely unharmed by the blast. He was floating for height, eyes half-open and glimmering in Zelgadis's lighting spell. He leaned forward, hair swinging forward and blocking her line of sight, but it looked to Lina very like…

-- No. Noooo. Maybe Xel, but definitely not Zel.

The lighting spell flickered out with Zelgadis's concentration.

"Holy shit."

"Lina? What's going on? It's dark…"

"Not now, Gourr –"

The next explosion reburied them, but Lina did not complain. She powered out of the debris, flung her own lighting spell into the space where the roof had been and surveyed the mess.

Zelgadis was spitting mad. Xellos was grinning. She blinked. "SO!" She said brightly. "Dolphin! Yes! Let's go see if she's behind this mess!"

"Right," Zelgadis muttered.

Lina bounded into the night, well away from the town they'd just woken out of a sound sleep, and decided that even if she had seen Xellos kiss Zelgadis, it was just some new manifestation of his madness. And if Zel hadn't exactly blown him away mid-kiss, well, he was probably just shocked.

Maybe she should talk to Zelgadis. Or maybe she _really shouldn't_ talk to Zelgadis. She tugged at her hair and made an inarticulate noise of frustration. "AH! WHATEVER! HURRY UP, GUYS!"

--

"Lina, I'm huuungry," Gourry complained.

"We're _all_ hungry," Lina growled, knuckling him in the head. "By the time we remembered to go back for supplies… they were waiting."

By which she meant the townsfolk, with pitchforks.

And cheese graters.

Zelgadis was not hungry. But he was also not suicidal, so he didn't say it.

"I'm not hungry!" Xellos chimed, right on cue.

Zelgadis threw him an incredulous look before he was swallowed in a pile of flailing limbs and red hair. Surely Lina's outrage couldn't possibly be so nourishing that he'd risk being beaten senseless _every single time_ he opened his mouth.

He scowled when he realised that he was trying to figure out what motivated Xellos – which meant that the stupid demon-priest's continued ploys to play on his insecurities about That Night were working.

Damnit.

He had a decent idea why Xellos would kiss him in front of Lina and Gourry. His embarrassment and outrage were hinted with a cold fear that they'd find out that he and Xellos had had sex.

Funny how he couldn't think that without blushing, he thought, feeling more detached from the situation than he had in days. Probably because Xellos was annoying someone else.

He was not so insecure to think that having accidental sex with Xellos – and didn't _that_ sound weird, like he'd fallen over and landed on Xellos with his legs spread or something, which was an image he really didn't need right now (or ever) – would make Lina and Amelia disown him or something. And it wasn't as though Gourry would care. It was just…

… so damned awkward. And _personal_, damnit. He didn't need them to know about – about –

And it _wouldn't_ be personal if he had to rehash the details for a crowd of teasing, overcurious companions, who could legitimately say that they were only worried for his welfare…

He garnered some odd looks, walking along with steam coming off his face.

…and Xellos had kissed him again. Gone to great lengths to kiss him again, really. And then again. And there was that weird neck-biting thing in the cave.

If it had been anybody else, Zelgadis might believe that they were interested in him. Well, he'd have to argue it out with his self-esteem, but he would likely have already reached the conclusion that despite his appearance, he'd won somebody over with his personality. Or something. Hey, girls liked the heartless, magic-using swordsmen types, right?

Well, look at Zangulus. He had _nothing_ else going for him, and he married a princess.

Oh, gods. "Kill me now," he muttered.

"Ah, did you say something, Zelgadis-san?" Xellos asked, bright and cheerful. Ridiculous. He knew what was under those curved eyes and cutesy tone.

"No."

One eye opened a crack. "Are you certain, Zel-chan?"

He would not kill him. He would not kill him. He would not… "Positive," he ground out.

"Okay, then! Just checking! Wouldn't want anything to happen to you, you know?" Xellos beamed.

Now Lina was giving both of them a weird look.

Great. "When are we going to get Amelia back?" He wondered.

"No idea! Hopefully the spell will wear off in the normal passage of time! Humans are good that way. Since she had to have absorbed some of the water, it'll most likely carry the spell out when she sweats or cries or –"

"We've got it, thanks." Lina said dryly.

Xellos smiled. Not that it was unusual, or anything.

Zelgadis grunted. So they wouldn't have Amelia for a distraction at any point in the next, oh, ten seconds. Could this day gat any worse?

"Ah, I think that's the port," Xellos said from his perch on thin air several feet into the sky.

"Food!" Lina yelped, tripping Gourry up and racing over the crest of the next hill.

"Hey! No fair!"

"All's fair in love, war and FOOD!" Lina screamed back.

"Did that make any sense to you, Zel-chan?" Xellos asked, floating cross-legged next to his head.

Zelgadis ignored him. Soon they'd find Dolphin, either come to some kind of compromise or blow her sky high and fix Amelia. And then everything would be normal, and he could forget all about That Night and never, ever have sex again, for fear of the memories.

Now look what he's done, Zel thought. As though he hadn't been screwed up enough.

Xellos's closed eyes seemed trained on him.

"What?" he snarled.

"Is it really so bad?" he asked curiously.

"IS IT -- !" Zelgadis cut himself off and took a deep breath. "You. Need to stop. Kissing. Me," he said slowly and clearly. "It's not funny. It wasn't funny to begin with."

Xellos opened his eyes a crack. His eyes were so strange to look at, so unexpected in such a human face, but Zelgadis found with a shock that he was getting used to them. He supposed that Xellos wasn't as careful about not letting his eyes show after he'd been ousted as an inhuman. But it seemed wrong to take it for granted.

"Who's laughing?" Xellos asked, looking rather nonplussed.

But then, didn't they take it for granted that he wasn't human anyway? They'd gotten so used to it. Even when he tried to sell Lina out to Valgarv…

Zelgadis didn't know what he was trying to think about. He was mad, mad, mad, like a werewolf chasing its tail. No. He wasn't mad. There was nothing to talk about. Nothing to think about, so it was silly to be thinking about it.

"If it's not amusing you and it's not amusing me, why the hell are you still doing it?"

"I wonder?" Xellos said. "You'd better hurry, Zel-kun, or they'll have been thrown out before you can get your coffee."

--

Heh. That was chapter ten! Wow! Yay! Rejoicing!

Okay, so there wasn't a huge amount of plot-development here, but we DID drive Zel crazy, so… yay! Any questions, comments, etcetera… really, ANYTHING… is welcome.


	11. The Tide

See first chapter for disclaimer.

--

They had not been thrown out. In fact, for Lina-and-Gourry standards, they were more or less behaving themselves.

The waitstaff seemed a bit perturbed, but not completely terrified. Zelgadis remembered his last incident with a waitress and snagged a very un-cute waiter to demand coffee from instead.

He slouched into a seat, close enough to Lina and Gourry to feel included but far enough away to avoid being hit by stray food, and sunk his chin into his hand.

The place was actually a restaurant, ocean-themed with worn fishing net strung up across the wooden roof and a shark's head jutting out from above the myriad bottles behind the bar. From where he sat, he could see no water, but some tall ships and the white flash and dip of gulls' wings.

Ships were good, he thought, moodily accepting his coffee from Xellos and sipping it. Ships meant they'd be underway as soon as Lina had stuffed herself, and then they could kill Dolphin, fix Amelia and he would feel remotely sane again.

"You're not going crazy," Xellos said, sounding so flat and serious that Zelgadis looked up.

Then he looked back at his cup. Then he looked back at Xellos. "Because you would recognise sanity," he drawled.

Xellos ignored that. "Ah, Zelgadis-san, you're so self-centred," he sighed theatrically. "Do you really think that I only exist in relation to how much I can mess with you? Not, of course, that it isn't delightful," he added mildly.

"I know that! You always have an agenda of some kind," Zelgadis growled. He clenched his jaw and glowered into his coffee.

Xellos waited for him to resurface from his dark musings. He smiled his normal, cheerful smile but stared out from under his bangs with his bright eyes. "So, what if I just wanted to?" he asked.

"_Why_?" Zelgadis demanded.

"Because I don't remember," Xellos shrugged. "It's not something that often happens to Mazoku."

Zelgadis glanced sideways to be sure that Lina was still in the lala-land of the hungry. "I am not having sex with you so you can remember," he said flatly.

Xellos's eyebrows rose. "I didn't say anything about sex," he said it quite loudly enough to hear, but nobody paid him the least bit of attention, despite Zelgadis's flinch. Xellos blinked innocently.

Zelgadis glanced around, swallowed his thundering pulse, and did his best to ignore that. "And that only explains the first time. I _know_ the second time was just to piss me off. And if you're explaining it like this, then you've clearly got another reason!"

"Yes, but you didn't believe that one!"

"What, so you're just trying to give me a reason I'll _believe_?" Zelgadis snarled. He hadn't realised that he'd stood up, hands slammed into the wood before him, until the coffee sloshed over the edge of his cup and onto his hand. Ow. He ignored it.

Xellos blinked. "What do you want?" he asked, looking a bit confused by the whole situation.

Zelgadis huffed and sat back down. "The truth might be a nice change of pace."

"I haven't lied," Xellos shrugged.

Zelgadis glared. "Is this part of some insane plot to destroy the group dynamic?"

He raised his eyebrows again. It just looked so damned _odd_ with his eyes open and like that. "Now why would I want that? Your plans match mine perfectly."

"That's not an answer."

"No, Zelgadis-san," he sighed. "It's not part of any plot involving the tearing apart of your little group. Furthermore, to my knowledge, Juu-ou-sama is not scheming against you at present, and if she were, she would probably not be quite _this_ roundabout about it. Does that answer your questions?"

"Not by half," Zelgadis muttered, wondering why Xellos was offering information, and if this was just another phase of his plan to turn Zelgadis into a headcase, but when he looked up from the swirls of his breath on his coffee, Xellos was gone.

Of course.

About fifteen minutes later, Lina shelled out the money for their lunch and they headed down to the docks to see if they could entice some enterprising captain to take them to the general vicinity of Deep-Sea's waters for a buttload of cash. The city boasted some militarily straight piers, and some seriously industrial ships that were as thick and bulky as whales, but not nearly as hydrodynamic. Some seemed sunk dangerously deep into the water, and most of them had tawdry figureheads of mostly-naked women and mermaids.

"Passengers? Depends on the price. Where're you headed?" The captain of _The Second Ceiphied_, a man with a broad, red face and a lingering scent of rough whisky and old sweat, eyed Lina up and down. "An' what're you payin' in?" he drawled.

Lina twitched. Gourry inched away.

"Gold," said Zelgadis dryly, wondering why, having spoken to her, anybody would take Lina over the money. Seriously. "To get to the Demon Sea." He snapped his fingers in front of the man's face when his attention drifted to Lina's glower.

He went white. "The Demon Sea? Sorry. I don't take passengers," he said shortly.

"You just said that you would, if the price was right." Lina said, red eyes darkening.

"I think you misheard me," he said.

Gourry frowned. "But --"

"Piss off, mate." The man growled.

Lina touched her index finger to her forehead. Then she sighed and took Gourry by the hair. "Come on," she decided. "I'm sure there's a man with a spine _and_ a boat somewhere in this town."

"Ship," the _Ceiphied's_ captain corrected automatically.

Lina waved that off. They moved down the docks, hunting for a brave seafaring man to take them to the Demon Sea in the southeast. Unfortunately, it went about as Zelgadis expected -- a lot of cocksure seaman suddenly turned deaf and blind to their presence at Lina's opening offer.

"Should have said we were going somewhere else and hijacked the ship," Zelgadis grumbled at the sixth turn-down.

Lina growled low in her throat. "If you'd suggested that a little EARLIER, we might have had a chance," she snapped.

"Funny, I didn't hear you coming up with any bright ideas," he said dryly, staring down an old lady who had stopped inspecting the day's catch to stare at him. She turned her eyes away, made the local sign against evil and hurried in the opposite direction, protesting grandchild in tow.

Charming, he thought, and scowled.

Lina and Gourry didn't even notice. "What the hell's your problem, anyway?" Lina turned on him, cloak flaring as she did. Her index finger poked him in the chest. "You're even moodier than usual -- and don't tell me it's because of Amelia. We ALL --" she cut herself off before she could say something needlessly sentimental and expose her relative humanity to her companions. "Anyway, we know she's safe. Ish," she added.

Zelgadis gave her a blank stare. He was pretty good at expressionless. It was one of his favourite expressions, almost as comfortable on his face as pissed off or irritable. "You'll notice that this ridiculous business with a Mazoku lord after your hide is taking valuable time away from my search -- again," he said.

Lina gaped at him for a second. "Z -- Zel, you..." She blinked. "YOU SELFISH, SELF-CENTERED, ARROGANT --!" Her voice rose and rose, soaring effortlessly into the higher ranges of rage, eyes lit up like summer lightning bugs.

"Excuse me," interrupted a woman walking by. "Perhaps I can help you." She had a perfect tan, long, blond hair and legs up to her armpits. Her body was sheathed in a white sundress, her feet perched on five-inch heels, her eyes veiled by dark sunglasses.

Zelgadis almost didn't recognise her with her clothes on.

But then he started to make strangled noises.

Lina, righteously pissed off, ignored him. "Yeeees?" she wheedled.

"I hear you need to get to the Demon Sea in the south. It just so happens that I have a ship, and I'll take you there -- for a price."

"What kind of price?" Lina asked.

"The low, low price of your immortal soul," Zelgadis deadpanned. The Beastmaster shot him a positively wounded look. She was not… expected, for a Mazoku lord. He thought about Phibrizzo and felt cold.

"So why's she asking Lina?" Gourry wondered.

There was a pause. Lina growled. Gourry wilted.

Zelgadis opened his mouth to tell Lina not to let Xellas take them, and found that he had no voice. He blinked. A strangled croak was the best he could do. Gourry thumped him on the back. Xellas beamed at him.

"Oh… how do you feel about seventy gold pieces?" she purred.

"SEVENTY? Try TWELVE."

"Oh, well. I suppose you'll find another ship," she shrugged.

Lina sagged. "Fifty."

"Done."

The ship was in at the harbour. It wasn't as big as the other ships, but it was black, sleek and long and clearly built for speed. It was flying a black flag, and some port officials were looking it over dubiously, talking among themselves from a safe distance.

The pretty, tanned woman beamed at Lina, Gourry and Zelgadis. "There she is!" She made a grand gesture toward the ship.

"Lady…" Lina rubbed her forehead like she had quite a headache. "You're a pirate?"

"I suppose you might put it that way," she said slowly. "But I prefer to be called a "high-risk trader"."

Lina sighed and waved a hand. "Okay, whatever."

"But Lina –" Gourry started.

"D'you see another boat?" she said in a low voice.

Zelgadis opened his mouth to say something, but choked on the words again. Finally, he just sighed, and followed the group.

The harbourmaster eyed Xellas with a wary eye when he approached her with several strong men in tow. "I couldn't help but notice that you're flying a black flag, Captain…?" he trailed off expectantly.

"Yes, I am." She smiled at him. "I find it goes with the décor on board. And, you know, my shoes."

"What is it that you're doing in port here, Captain?"

"Oh, you know. This and that, waiting for my crew to finish with their women and sober up… the usual."

He scowled. "I meant, your purpose here."

"Oh! Well, we thought we'd engage in a bit of rape, pillage and plunder, but I've just picked up some passengers, so we'll be off, quick-smart." She smiled a bit more.

"I'm afraid I'm going to have to ask you to remain here for a few hours while we search your vessel…"

Her smile faded. "Oooh. That could be a problem. See, my passengers really need to get to the Demon Sea quite quickly," she explained. "Do you think… no?" she sighed, at the hardening of the man's expression.

"You'll wait, Captain. My men are already on board. I'll allow you to accompany me up, if you want, but your passengers have to stay." He fixed an unfriendly eye on them.

Xellas sniffed. "Very well. Let's do it your way, harbourmaster." And she followed him onto the ship, which loomed black and silent out of the dark water.

They disappeared. Lina frowned. "Looks like we'll have to get another ship."

Zelgadis frowned. He didn't think the harbourmaster would stop the Beastmaster from leaving port if she wanted to, but he said nothing. If Lina was about to change her mind without him saying anything, it was all well and good.

"I don't know. She didn't seem really upset, did she?" asked Gourry.

Lina gave him an odd look. "Whoa. Unusually perceptive," she commented. "But she's a bit… odd. She might –"

"Passengers ho!" They all looked at the lovely blonde kicking her legs from her perch on the edge of the ship. She waved. "Are you coming?"

Lina sighed.

"But what about the harbourmaster?" Gourry asked.

"Who?" Xellas called back. "Come on, slowpokes! Are we going to the Demon Sea, or what?"

Zelgadis sighed, and followed the others. He boarded the Calamity Fair with a very bad feeling about this.

--

I pat you warmly on the head. Virtual cookies to the first person to get the _Avatar _reference!


	12. The Meeting

See first chapter for disclaimer.

---------------------------------

Zelgadis could not be sure where the hell Xellos had wandered off to, but the Beastmaster's sharp-edged smile assured him that they were well and truly out of the frying pan.

"So, the Demon Sea, hmm?" She purred, strapping on her general-pirate-issue, matte black eye patch and adjusting it carefully. "What takes you there? Doubtless some great and heroic quest?"

"Ah… something like that," Lina said, peering around the deck for any sign of the harbourmaster – or, indeed, a crew. "Where did the harbourmaster go, anyway?" she asked.

"Eaten by wolves, I'm afraid," Xellas said sadly. "Truly tragic."

"WOLVES?" Gourry yelped and drew his sword with a steely _shink_. "You keep wolves on your boat, lady?"

"Mmm…? No, don't be silly. Now, why don't you raise the sales? A strapping young man like you should have no problem!" She beamed at him and tugged him toward the main mast by his bicep.

Lina leaned surreptitiously toward Zelgadis. "Does she kind of scream, 'suspicious' to you, too?" she hissed.

He could see one of the Beastmaster's delicate, not-quite-canine ears twitch, its point emerging from a tangle of hair. He nodded, once more struck silent by her magic and unable to vocalise his dire warning.

"We'll just have to keep an eye on her, I guess," Lina sighed. Zelgadis rolled his eyes. As though _keeping an eye_ on her would actually help. He scowled and crossed his arms over his chest. Although he was not at all talkative man, the stranglehold Xellas had on his vocal chords was becoming very inconvenient.

He was half tempted to just wave his arms and physically force Lina to disembark – as soon as they were out of the range of her most casual magic, he'd be able to explain, or perhaps he could even write it down, but…

He scowled harder out over the railing of the _Calamity Fair_. Unfortunately, he was in the unique position to know that the Beastmaster was very likely taking them where they wanted to go – even if 'wanted' was hardly a fair way to put it – and, given the attack on her own forces, she had to have something invested in getting them there safely.

But it was very much against his better judgement to rely upon a Mazoku for anything. His depest instincts were whimpering pathetically, and knowing what she was, he found it difficult to imagine that Lina couldn't tell. His scowl became almost tangible.

Lina nudged him in the side to get his attention. It would have been discrete, but she was a little too rough and ended up muttering curses and rubbing her bruised elbow. The reason was made clear when he looked up to see their tanned "pirate" captain sauntering back toward them, her long legs glinting bronze in the sunlight.

"What a nice young man," she commented. "Now, Lina-san, Zelgadis, where in the Demon Sea do you actually need to be?"

"Uh…" Lina overlooked the woman's apparent familiarity with Zelgadis, caught out by her question. "How big can a sea possible be?" she muttered to herself. "Dunno," she said then, shrugging. "We'll figure it out when we get there."

The Beastmaster raised one eyebrow, slowly.

"It's heroic quest standard, okay?" Lina snapped at her.

"Oh, I see. Well, I'm headed for Sea Mammal Island," Xellas said, rather pointedly, "so I'll just drop you off there." She smiled again, flashing teeth.

"Sea Mammal…?" Lina frowned at her.

It was not the first time that Zelgadis wondered if all this stuff about Mazoku being subtly manipulative was a load of crock and people were just too stupid to notice the obviousness of their ploys. He wouldn't put it past human stupidity. But then, they'd been tricked by underhanded Mazoku before, so he resolved to search for the deeper layers, the hidden plots and meanings in everything she said.

The Beastmaster tsked and sighed, slanting a disappointed gaze toward Zelgadis.

That was a bit creepy. Did she know what he was thinking? He was distracted by the sudden realisation that they were cutting neatly through the waves on a diagonal, even though Gourry had not yet managed to unfurl the sales.

On the tail-end of this thought, there was a crash and a hollow BOOM, followed by the noise of several score pounds of canvas falling to the deck. The ship dipped a little, but otherwise stayed right on course.

"Ow. Ow, help," Gourry's voice was several octaves too high. Zelgadis winced.

Lina glowered in his general direction and stomped off to help him up and knock him senseless for breaking whatever it was he'd broken.

Zelgadis doubted that it was of great necessity to the running of the ship. He scowled at the Beastmaster, who was no longer smiling.

"Now, Zelgadis," she said, playfully polite, eyes glinting. "You're in a tight spot. If you do tell Lina-san who I am, then I will dump you in the middle of the ocean, and you know you won't find anybody else to take you to the Demon Sea." She tilted her head, hair sliding like silk from her supple, rounded limbs. "Heavens, that poor Princess might _never_ get better!" She exclaimed, as though she'd just thought of it.

She tapped her bottom lip. "I suppose you could fly… if you didn't have the swordsman. He'll be quite the drain on your energy after a few miles, won't he?" She slanted her gaze toward the mess of canvas and flailing limbs not so far away. "And if you don't tell Lina-san, well… I could be up to something positively _heinous_."

She smiled. It was not the same smile she had given Lina.

He scowled. "I get your point," he muttered. Then, wondering how mad he really was, "I won't say anything."

Xellas blinked, slowly, her ageless eyes blank and inhuman. "Really. Well, now." And without bothering to tell him what that meant, she turned away. "There are cabins below," she said, and went to prevent Lina and Gourry from ripping apart her ship in an attempt to repair it.

Zelgadis was loath to take her advice, but he went below anyway, if only just to see the cabins. He was unsurprised to find them a deal bigger than a ship's cabin had any right to be – indeed, they were much larger on the inside than the laws of physics should have allowed.

There was another deep bang from above, and he decided that maybe just closing the door and napping was a better idea than going back up. He was tired, for one reason or other – possibly a delicate combination of a vicious hangover from whatever drugs Xellos had been feeding him over the past few days, and the general confusion of his mind.

He shut the door and all sound immediately ceased. Confused and alarmed, he yanked it open, just in time to hear Lina yelling at Gourry. Just a sound-barrier, and not the exit to this little sub-dimension. With a shake of his head, he closed it again and walked the whole two paces to lay flat on the cot, which, miracle of miracles, supported his full weight with scant complaint. He stared at the tarred wooden ceiling. It span, just a little, at the edges. So tired.

Xellos. What the hell was his game? Aside from, perhaps, annoying Zelgadis for his own diabolical amusement. But if that was the case, he'd picked a very roundabout way of doing it.

Perhaps he wanted to annoy _and_ confuse Zelgadis for his own diabolical amusement.

Zelgadis sighed. Yes, that seemed to be in character. If anything could really be said to be in character.

He clutched his sword a little closer, closed his eyes and, as he drifted off, hoped they wouldn't wake him until they'd actually reached the island. He didn't want to be cognizant for any longer than absolutely necessary.

He got his wish, at a price: feverish dreams of blistering hands wrapped around his neck and the cool gleam of moonlight, of sex and violence and green eyes in running water.

--------------------------------

Xellos was waiting for them when they approached the island. He was atop the crumbling ruin of a commercial dock, its rough, broken edges grey and wet. He looked as he ever did: smile firmly affixed, red-tipped staff glinting in the grey morning light. Winter was coming to this part of the world, and the wind tossed his silly haircut around in all directions, icy and fickle.

Sea Mammal Island was an odd, swampy place. Here and there, dry patches of land spread, but they didn't seem to be very wide… and something about them seemed untrustworthy. Zelgadis looked over the island with deep suspicion, stretching out his senses to feel the astral plane – something seethed and roiled below the calm, if ominous surface. He closed his eyes and almost smelt the smoke.

The _Calamity Fair_ drew closer, just close enough that the gangplank could reach the dock, and Lina bounded down it with enthusiasm, Gourry in tow. "Thanks, pirate lady!" She called over her shoulder.

Zelgadis opened his eyes and followed at a more sedate pace, squinting in the sunlight. He'd slept for two days – a long time for most people, and even longer for him. Theoretically, he didn't need much sleep. He felt groggy, but stepping out into the freezing wind woke him up fast.

He saw the Beastmaster lean over the railing at the front of her ship. "You kids have fun now!" She waved, beaming.

Lina sweatdropped. Zelgadis took it in grim stride. He was more or less resigned now: his life would forever be a massive parody of itself.

Just to prove him right, Xellos popped into existence next to him as they all walked along the dock. "Did you miss me?" he cooed.

"Not really. How's Amelia?"

Xellos waved this off as though it had been a complete non-sequitur. "She's coming along. Be fine, eventually."

"You're sure?" Lina asked, having overheard the edges of their exchange.

"Of course, Lina-san!"

She made a disgusted noise and shook her head. "Well, we're still down a healer. Right. How do we find Dolphin?" she asked, stopping at the edge of an inky quagmire.

"How about her house?" Xellos suggested, pointing to a nearby stretch of dry land. Upon it, there was indeed a small cottage. It seemed to have a delightful little garden out the front, which was made of a border of smoking swamp vines.

Lina frowned. "We just go up and knock?" she demanded. "Doesn't that seem a bit too easy?" she eyed the place with deep suspicion. The garden looked nasty, but the actual house was a whitewashed little thing that looked like it belonged behind a white picket fence.

"Lina-san! Haven't you ever been told not to look a gift-horse in the mouth?"

"It makes sense that she'd be at her house," Gourry agreed, missing the point totally and picking up a nearby stick to gauge the depth of the swamp.

Lina glanced at Zelgadis. He shrugged. It didn't matter much to him: either they'd have to fight their way through a bunch of stupid Mazoku enchantments or they'd walk up and knock. Either way, they would see Dolphin, and then they would probably have to kill her. Or she would kill them.

If she killed them, then he supposed there would be nothing left to worry about.

"Let's go," he said.

Lina scowled at him. "Fine, okay," she muttered, and cast levitation to get across the swampy patch, leaving Gourry to muddle along in the swamp with his stick.

Zelgadis sighed and grabbed their swordsman by one arm, casting the same spell.

The garden didn't try to eat them. It just smelt like rotting garden and smoked a bit. They walked up to Dolphin's quaint little cottage and knocked on the front door. As far as dramatic entrances went, it was a bit of a bust.

The door was opened by a young woman with ragged blue hair and bluer eyes, her figure as boyish and cute as Xellas's was lush. Her eyes were shadowed, but they showed white the whole way round her irises, and she stared at them as they all paused outside her door.

The smell of cigarette smoke hung around her, although that could have been because it had melted into the walls of the house over the millennia.

Lina stared at her. The girl could have been her age. She frowned. "Are you Deep-Sea Dolphin?"

The Mazoku's appearance was indeed deceptive, but Zelgadis, at least, could feel the buzz of chill, black power under her skin. She wasn't trying to hide it, so it leaked from her, oozed across his dull senses on the astral plane. It felt… off, somehow. He shifted back a fraction. He did not like that feeling. Xellos gave him a curious glance.

"Sometimes," the girl said, sounding dull and incurious. "Have you come to steal from me?" She didn't sound as though she cared much one way or the other.

"Uh…" Lina looked like she was about to say no, but then paused. "Do you have something worth stealing?"

"No." She stopped. "I don't think so."

"I haven't come to steal from you." Annoyed, she rolled her eyes. "Basically, we just want to know why the hell you've got some weird grudge against us," she said, getting straight to the point, "And, you know, if we have to fight, I'd prefer to get it over with."

If this was a blasé way to tread a dread Mazoku lord, well, Lina was a bit jaded about the whole bloody thing. And Gourry was too stupid to do anything but stand by and nod in agreement.

Zelgadis glanced at Xellos to determine his reaction, and wondered when he'd decided that _Xellos_, of all people, was any kind of measuring rod for gauging a situation. Particularly this situation. But he was unreadable as always – and Zelgadis was sort of glad, because it meant that he hadn't started reading into Xellos's smiles. That way lay madness.

Dolphin's bleak blue eyes flickered with something like actual feeling for a moment, her pupils slitted and suddenly grew enormous, expanding until there was only a thin ring of sapphire around them. Then, "You're a very strange human, girl," she said. "But I don't know you, I think. I think I would have remembered you. You have such bright hair," she said with a half-smile, and leaned forward to run her fingers through it.

Lina eyed her hand like the fang of a poisonous snake and stepped back. Dolphin just leaned forward.

She was taking this too lightly, Zelgadis thought, hid fingers shifting nervously to the hilt of his sword. Lina had enough training in shamanism to know she was very, very dangerous just from being in this kind of proximity. They were right when they said Dolphin was mad: there was something very wrong with her spirit, something that made him feel sicker with every twist and turn of her mood.

"Or maybe I do," Dolphin said, pensively. She cocked her head, frowning as though they'd answered her. Then she nodded. "You weren't the one who took my staff, were you?"

Lina frowned in confusion. "Your what?"

Her fingers tightened in Lina's hair, and she tugged her close. Her eyes glinted with light that wasn't there. "My _staff_," she hissed, low and intent, eyes boring into Lina's face.

"Lina-san doesn't have a staff!" Xellos cut in cheerfully.

Dolphin's attention moved. "You," she said, very softly. "I know you. It was you, wasn't it? You took it?" her lips continued to move, too low and fast for anybody to hear anything but a hiss, and she stared at Xellos. "It's her, isn't it? She took it. You took it."

The Mazoku lord moved past Lina and Gourry as though they weren't even there, weaving a little, her eyes unfocused. Zelgadis got out of the way before she tried to walk through him.

Xellos shifted slowly away. "Maaa, Dolphin-sama, I don't know what you could possibly be talking about!"

"She's got good instincts, though," Lina whispered to Gourry, who nodded.

She snatched at the red clasp of his cloak and pulled him forward with no effort at all. "I want it _back,_" she hissed. The ragged edges of her hair twisted and lengthened and slithered eel-like over her shoulders. Zelgadis could feel her power on his skin like something that had broken badly, jagged at the edges.

"I haven't been here in centuries! How could I have taken anything from you, Dolphin-sama?" Xellos was feigning innocence and sincerity, quite badly. "I really just came to say hello!" He added with a grin that was a little manic at the edges.

"...Hello?" she repeated. Her hair slowed its serpentine writhing. Her eyes cleared. "Xellos," she said in a very unfriendly tone, and didn't let go of him. "What does my sister want from me enough that she is willing to sacrifice you to get it?" Her hands grew claws that ripped into his clothing.

"Wait, wait, WHAT?" Lina demanded, taking Xellos by the hair and hauling him away from Dolphin. The lady blinked and let go. "We just want to know why you've been attacking us, and whether or not we're going to have to fight about it." She glowered at Dolphin, her hands on her hips. Gourry, looming behind her, nodded, his eyes hard and intent. Fighting, at least, was something he understood.

Dolphin turned her brightly-glowing eyes on Lina. Zelgadis could feel the cold threat of her power bubbling up from under the surface of the astral plane. His stomach turned.

"Uh, Lina..." Xellos was edging away from the zone of immediate threat. Zelgadis flashed him a look of disgust and moved closer, readying a spell under his breath.

She bent low to look Lina in the face. "When I attack you," she said very softly, "you won't stand around talking about it." Her eyes flicked back to Xellos. "I have nothing for you, Beast-Priest," she said, and her eyes glazed a little on the last syllable. "Leave. Or die." Her voice was uncaring, indifferent. Her glance took in the whole group.

Lina frowned at her. "Guess we'll be leaving, then," she muttered, looking annoyed, "Come on, guys," she said, watching the Mazoku warily over her shoulder as she retreated.

Dolphin blinked at her. Zelgadis couldn't tell, but he didn't think her eyes were focused enough to actually see anything. He frowned and followed the others back through her garden.

"Well, that was unhelpful," Lina muttered darkly. "I thought we'd go in, kick some dark lord butt and get out, all before midnight," she sighed.

"Yes, because it always works like that," Zelgadis responded. "Anyway," he added, a little dubiously, "she could have been lying."

Lina raised an eyebrow. "Not unless she's a lot more stable than she seems," she said.

"She could be," Zelgadis said with a shrug.

"She isn't," Xellos said flatly.

Zelgadis saw Lina's expression freeze at the same time his did. They traded gazes and turned to him. "What makes you so sure?" Zelgadis asked suspiciously. There was nothing more suspicious than Xellos sharing information Something was seriously wrong with the natural order.

He shrugged, and didn't elaborate. Zelgadis and Lina looked at each other again. Well, that was just great, they thought, almost in unison. Either they were trusting Xellos's word, or they were trusting Dolphin's.

And worst of all, the _Calamity Fair_ had sailed away without a trace.

Lina's enraged shrieks echoed from the empty dock.

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Hey, guys. Sorry for the long wait! A long update for you, much more plot-intensive. =D Thanks for waiting for me.


	13. The Trail

See first chapter for disclaimer.

--------------------------------

The crumbling docks were actually in worse repair than Zelgadis had initially noticed. He wondered for a second how the _Calamity Fair_ had navigated the massive chunks of rubble in the water -- and then decided not to follow that thought all the way.

The water was so clear that he could actually see the huge pieces of ruined cement and wood in the water, and with a little squinting, he thought he could detect scorch marks. "Did something happen here?" he asked nobody in particular.

Lina looked at him and scowled. "Did you miss the part where we can't carry Gourry over the whole ocean without Amelia's help? WE'RE STUCK HERE."

"Hangon, something's..." he squinted harder at a dark glint balanced between two splintered wooden supports. His initial instinct in dealing with strange glows in Mazoku-infested areas was to leave them the hell alone, but given that the problem they were dealing with (or not dealing with, depending on one's perspective) was reliant on water, curiosity got the better of him.

"Lina. Look at this," he said shortly, and the little sorceress stopped raging for a second to peer into the water.

"I don't see... oh, hmm. In-ter-es-ting," she licked her lips. "It would stand to reason that a few magic baubles would be hanging around Dolphin's island," she said slowly. "Check it out. I'll cover you." She paused. "Unless you know anything about this," she added over her shoulder.

"Why would I know anything more about such a thing than you?" Xellos asked with a tilt of his head. "You're the resident black magic expert!"

"I figured you'd be the resident Mazoku expert," Lina said dryly. "Since you seem actually willing to help for a change."

"Depends what you mean by '_resident_', really," Xellos said cheerfully.

Zelgadis sighed. "_Raywing_." He muttered the incantation and lowered himself into the freezing water, safe inside his bubble of mobile air.

He disrupted a minimum of debris as he manipulated the currents. The support beams were heavy, but Zel was strong, and a little strain dislodged one of them, allowing him to see the objective of his hunt.

The glinting was the shriveled black eye of a dead fish-man. His body had been left in the water too long -- his lips and tongue were bloated, and Zel could see a greenish cast in areas. The barrier of the raywing bubble prevented the smell, but a gingerly extended finger showed skin slippage, and the occasional movement convinced him that all sorts of creatures had made the putrefied body their home.

He stayed for long enough to try to detect what had killed it -- he could see no obvious wounds, although it was hard to tell in the midst of fast watery decay.

He surfaced. "A body," he said. "A pretty recent body. Revolting," he added, and touched back to the ground, totally dry.

Lina scrunched up her nose. "Ew," she said. "What killed it?"

Zelgadis shrugged. "I'm not a doctor. Nothing ripped open."

Lina frowned. "I want to check for black magic residue. From what she said, somebody took a staff from Dolphin. I don't think it would be too stupid to assume that anything somebody would steal from a Mazoku of her power would be a pretty powerful magic item... and if the death is recent --"

"You think it could be connected to the attacks on us?" Zelgadis mused. "Seems too fresh... but then, maybe a fish-man wouldn't decay as fast in water as a human would... if the body was on land, I'd say it was about right."

"Wow, Zel, I didn't know you knew so much about dead things!" Gourry blinked at him.

Zelgadis scowled at him and didn't deign to respond. Enough time spent working for Rezo had inured him to some of the less pleasant aspects of magical , in the old days, even Rezo had used pigs...

Lina nodded. "We're going to have to pull it up," she decided darkly. "Okay, Zel, Gourry. Go get it."

"Wait, what? Why don't _you_ go get it?" Zelgadis growled. He was unwilling to go near that thing again, much less touch it.

Lina batted her eyes. "You wouldn't want poor li'l me to break a nail, would you?" she twirled a lock of flaming hair around one finger and scuffed her toes.

So somehow Zelgadis ended up back in the water, this time with a half-naked Gourry swimming alongside him. And somehow, he eneded up back on land with Lina berating them when half of the fish-man's skin sloughed off, revealing far more of the fauna inside his body than Zelgadis had really hoped to see.

It was probably a good thing that Amelia wasn't there, he reflected, reluctantly extending his senses to the body as Lina, grimacing slightly, tugged off one glove and ran her hand just above the exposed flesh for any telltale magic resonance. Amelia would not deal well with this sort of situation. Even fresh bodies made her ill.

On the other hand, present company should be enjoying the experience immenseley. Zelgadis glanced up to see where Xellos was hovering -- and found him missing. Of course. What else should he have expected?

---------------------------------

"The staff?" Xellas looked annoyed but not terribly surprised by this news. "I suppose it was her way to put a lot of her power into objects, and nothing has technically been done that could not have been devised by almost anybody, and merely augmented..." she huffed. "It could even have been a human, with the right amount of ritual power," she admitted.

Xellos lifted his head and relaxed. "The greater ability to cloud my mind than Zelgadis-san's wouldn't suggest --"

"Oh, it's probably a Mazoku," Xellas agreed, waving away the slimmer likelihood of human involvement. "It would take a mage deeply buried in our arts to contrive a spell like that." She paused again. "How does the princess fare?"

"There are no... immediate signs, of recovery," Xellos hedged.

"Hmm."

"The corpse Lina-san located not long ago shows signs of similar magical interference," he added.

"Ahh. Did you tell her?"

"Of course not."

Xellas nodded. "Wise, for the moment. She is likely to die, then," she added, contemplatively. "Amelia-san has never been integral to our plans... although she is an important part of the group's dynamic, and would make a useful hostage, should the situation become dire." She tilted her head. "Well, you are welcome to do as you will about that," she shrugged. "She is not necessary."

Xellos nodded. "And the staff?"

"Retrieve it."

He nodded again. "I can follow it from Dolphin's home."

He didn't feel her move, but suddenly she was standing before him, and his head was level with the smooth curve of a tanned thigh. Her long fingernails trailed through his hair idly. "Good boy," she said, lips slowly curving into a condescending smile.

He watched the inconsistent light glint from her anklets and waited for her to finish before shifting through space on the trail of Dolphin's stolen power.

--------------------------------- 

One day later, Lina and Gourry were flopped on a chair-shaped piece of rubble in a gooey pile of underfed whinning. Occasionally, they were drowned out by a particularly loud wave, or an icy, vicious gust of wind that stole the noise away.

Zelgadis was attaching his cloak to a rough-hewn raft. Maybe they hadn't noticed yet, but the smell of the slowly-rotting fish man was enough to drive him away. He didn't like the idea of giving up his cloak in the freezing weather, but he didn't suppose Lina would be helpful enough to sacrifice hers, and he could see from the way she was biting on the occasional piece of cement that even he would not be safe from being gnawed. He didn't relish the thought.

It started to rain. Heavily. Within minutes, Zelgadis's clothing was heavy with water.

"Are you still here?" Xellos's painfully cheerful voice intruded on his angry funk of productive energy. Zelgadis shot him such a glare that he took a step back and held up his hands in mock surrender. "My, my, Zelgadis-san, you are cranky."

"Fancy. That." He growled, tying off one corner of his makeshift sale with a short strand of wiry hair. "Couldn't be because somebody left us stranded on this godforsaken island with a dead fish and no food."

"Really, Zelgadis... what were you expecting? She doesn't just hand out cookies to everybody, you know."

"Whatever," he growled, taking his sword and hacking at a piece of wood. "You can stand there and look annoying, or you can help," he added. "Only one of these gets us to figuring this out any faster."

"Menial labour?" Xellos tilted his head. "I thank you, but I'll decline. It's not really my area."

Zelgadis snarled. He shook his head to get the water dripping from his hair out of his eyes. "Fine. Whatever. Get Lina and Gourry, then. We're leaving."

"Where to, if I may ask?"

He had no idea. Somewhere else. Somewhere with food, so Lina would only be as much of a pain in the arse as she usually was. "No, you may not."

"Because, if you really wanted to know, I could probably link the residue from that corpse to other instances of similar magic," he said.

Zelgadis scowled at him. "She wants the staff, I take it."

"All I can say for sure is maybe," Xellos grinned.

Zelgadis grunted. "Get Lina and Gourry. Put them on the raft. They're on their own if they fall off. We're done here."

Xellos picked up both of them and deposited them on the raft from mid-air while Zelgadis held it against the tug of the water. Then he pushed it off, and landed very gently on the precarious craft with the help of a levitate spell. It didn't sink.

He breathed a sigh of relief. "What do you know? Something went right."

"So it would seem," Xellos agreed, landing lightly in the very limited space. "So the plan is to sail by sorcery until you're too tired, and then to row?" he queried.

"Unless you feel like helping," Zelgadis said dubiously.

"I will help."

Zelgadis blinked and looked up from ensurind his sale wasn't going to blow away. He scowled. "No you won't."

Xellos touched his heart, wounded. "Zelgadis! Of course I will help in your moment of need." He leaned on his staff and smiled brightly. "I'll give you directions."

Zel sighed, but he just couldn't be bothered getting angry. "Which way?"

"Hmm… that way," Xellos said, pointing, and Zelgadis readied a wind spell. "Or maybe that way," he amended, pointing in the opposite direction.

Zelgadis stopped and sighed. He rubbed his eyes and tried to pretend that he wasn't freezing and aching and bone-tired and frustrated to hell with every single person around him all at once. "You can't even be a little bit of help, can you?" he said.

"Oh, I can. I'm just not sure which way is north," he shrugged.

Zelgadis lifted his head tentatively and pointed. "That way."

"Oh, well, then, it's that way," Xellos said, pointing in a third direction. "Though, it's quite some distance away," he added.

"Of course," Zelgadis sighed, and blasted them on their course with a massive gust of wind.

-------------------------------- 

Amelia woke in the dark. Her eyes were sore. Her mouth was dry. Her muscles ached. She closed her eyes and felt their sting and breathed deep shaking breaths. When she opened them, everything was dark. She remembered… everything.

She'd attacked Zelgadis?

Gods above, she'd attacked Zelgadis _half naked_. For a second, she thought her face would combust. But then she rolled over and coughed very hard, and her hands came away from her mouth wet and sticky and the same temperature as her fevered body.

Mortification didn't matter quite so much when she licked the tip of her finger and tasted that rusty-iron flavour.

-------------------------------- 

Thanks for all of your lovely reviews, guys. As always, criticism and comments are appreciated.


	14. The City

Update. It's been a while. Did you think I was dead?

See first chapter for disclaimer.

* * *

Zelgadis knew their raft was not precisely travelling in the right direction. To be absolutely honest, it was very much travelling in the _wrong_ direction. Some might even go so far as to call it the opposite direction.

But Zelgadis was on his back and staring at the overcast sky, and he was very close to not caring anymore. Magical exhaustion was just as telling as the physical variety: his eyes were glazed and unfocused, his heart beat was well over a healthy resting rate, and his arms shook a just a little bit when he tried to raise them. If Lina had not been flopped to one side of the raft, moaning her hunger incoherently, it would have been another story entirely. But since she was a wobbly-legged spectre right at that moment, Zelgadis was the only thing moving the raft.

"Hmm. Zelgadis-san, we seem to be going backwards."

And now Xellos was back, doing his hovering thing, and Zelgadis didn't even have the energy to hit the idiot. A scowl was about the best he could manage. "Oh," he said dully. "It's you." There was a pause and then, "No more spells."

"No Lina, either," Xellos sat down cross-legged very close to Zelgadis. The chimera would have complained – physically complained, really – but there was really no other place for him to sit on the small and poorly lashed-together raft.

"_You_ could help," Zel pointed out idly. He had very little hope of such a thing coming to pass. "I would really like to see dry land again soon." He did not usually get sea-sick, but laying on his back staring at the sky and feeling the persistent tugging of the sea made his stomach churn. After a moment's further thought, that, too, could be blamed on Xellos and his master's stupid poisonous cookies.

"I hate you," he added.

Xellos smiled cheerfully. "Ohh... and that's such a pity, Zelgadis-san. I certainly won't be helping you _now_. Ha-ha-ha! Oh, well."

He was so. Damned. Obnoxious. Zel ground his teeth. "As though you were going to help," he corrected. But he had to wonder, which was of course the point of Xellos's exercise.

"I might have. Now you'll never know! Well, I'm still willing to _sell_ my services," he added in a mischievous purr.

"No," Zelgadis growled. "No _way_. Gourry and Lina aren't even unconscious, just hungry." Then he winced at how that sounded. He could not have given Xellos a more generous opening if he'd made the conscious effort.

"My, Zelgadis. Your mind certainly jumped there very quickly! So you're saying you're only worried about Lina or Gourry finding out?" he smiled widely.

"I'm worried that my friends will think as little of me as I already do, yes," he said rather spitefully, although Xellos was more or less impossible to upset if he was not predisposed to it, and so the mazoku just smiled at him as they drifted farther and farther away from their goal.

Zelgadis did not want to be drifting, but he staunchly supported the distance as a physical measurement of his own will power against Xellos's offer. Perhaps trying to persuade him into helping of his own will, he asked: "Aren't you on some kind of time frame, here?"

"Not really," Xellos shrugged. And then his smile became much less pleasant. "Although _you_ certainly are, Zelgadis." Zel glanced at him with some surprise. "It's a secret, of course," he added, shrugging.

"Right," Zelgadis drawled. "I'll just have to trust you."

"Have I ever steered you – Hmm." Xellos stopped mid-sentence. "Well, have I ever gotten any of you killed?"

"Not yet," Zelgadis muttered, and slowly hauled himself to his feet. The raft was too broad and ungainly to row without an extra set of arms, and Gourry was just as much down for the count as Lina was. He sighed and readied another wind spell. He'd pace himself, he thought. The raft didn't have to go all that fast, just in the right direction.

Xellos watched, cross-legged between his insensible companions, with an unreadable smile. Zelgadis had the horrible feeling that behind that annoying grin, his inhuman mind was ticking, cogs and gears creaking slowly in well-worn paths, and he was much, much closer to the answer than Zelgadis was.

It was a few horrible hours later when the obnoxious priest opened his mouth again and rather dryly said, "As tempting as it is to watch you kill yourself trying to get to the mainland, Zelgadis-san, I think you might be able to enlist Lina's help."

Zelgadis glanced over his shoulder balefully and said nothing.

Xellos smiled brightly and poked the redheaded sorceress with a stick, which had certainly not been around before. "There will be food on the mainland, Lina-san," he said.

Thirty minutes later saw their raft, breaking apart, hurtling for a commercial dock. Lina was screaming something as she powered the vessel through sheer will power, but it was difficult to tell what through the foam flecking her lips.

Xellos was standing on top of the makeshift (splintered) mast, looking in front of them with one hand shielding his eyes. Gourry was clinging to Lina's leg for dear life, and Zelgadis was doing the same to an edge of the raft, fighting the wind of their momentum.

They were not slowing down. "Lina --!" Zelgadis yelled over the noise of the water rushing past him and the wind. She ignored him, and they still weren't slowing down.

"Oh, my," said Xellos, and disappeared.

With the crack and splinter of tortured wood, their raft smashed violently against the pier – its pilings, to be exact – and then bits of wood were flying, slowed only slightly by the water.

Very wet, Zelgadis clung to one of the pillars, coughing water and spitting something unflattering about Lina's parentage, under the shadow of the pier. He blinked in the sudden dark.

Then the wood gave an unwholesome crack, and he had just enough time to yelp, "_Raywing,_" and get out of there before the whole pier gave way.

Floating in the air, he could see it like a chain reaction, the wood crumpling and splashing into the water, white foam surging around the disturbances. The supports must have been rotten, he reasoned, coming to rest lightly on his feet – as lightly as Zelgadis did anything, anyway.

There was no sign of Lina or Gourry, except that the bustling commercial docks were now totally empty. Lina could have that effect on people sometimes.

Well, except for Xellos. He was perched on the side of the adjoining pier, whistling softly to himself as he waited for something to nibble on his fishing line. Zelgadis scowled at him.

"Try that way, Zelgadis-san," he murmured, lifting one hand from the fishing rod to point. His closed eyes were still fixed toward the water, where Zelgadis knew there were certainly no fish, and if there had been they had definitely been scared away when Lina crashed the raft, but –

"Okay," he said, and began walking up the road Xellos had indicated. There was no widespread destruction, but it was a fairly wide road, so it was possible that everybody had been able to get out of Lina's way before she ripped them open and began devouring their entrails in a hungry frenzy.

Ten minutes later, Zelgadis was growing suspicious of Xellos's directions. He should, he realised, have been suspicious when the mazoku had _given _them, but he hadn't been thinking about that at the time.

Now, he sighed, glowered about him, and kept walking. He'd find them eventually. Helpfully, the sun was setting, burning red behind the clouds. He was always a little bit less conspicuous at night.

It was strange, though. This district wasn't just empty, it seemed long-deserted. A newspaper from last year fluttered through the street, and a one-wheeled cart stood battered and broken against a wall, to which a bunch of very old advertisements were taped – S_tay-Nots! Protective Necromancy for the Whole Family!_ was taped half over an even older, peeling sign for _Esmerelda Enchantress's Penile Enhancements_.

He stood very still, and heard nothing but his own measured breaths. Absolutely nothing. Not the scamper of a rat, not the night-time murmurs of sleepy birds, nothing. The newspaper scrunched and fluttered its way down the hill he'd walked up with the next gust of wind, and that was something of a relief.

Perhaps it was deserted, but there was no _reason_ for it to be deserted: no ghosts, no horrifying apparitions, not even a termite infestation as far as he could see. Perhaps they had a cockroach problem or something, but which city didn't?

"Quite disconcerting at night, isn't it?"

Zelgadis spun.

He was facing the kindly-faced old priest who had trapped him in Ferious. The man was leaning heavily on a staff, wrapped from head to toe in the black of his oddly-constructed clothing.

"Padre," said Zelgadis dryly – and cautiously. He knew now that this man was a better order of sorcerer than the others of his order, and he had to be careful. "Come to eradicate me?"

"Not today," the priest admitted. "It's necessary to keep up a certain morale among the youngest of the Order, and you know how battles with real mazoku can go," he smiled faintly.

"So you knew I wasn't a demon, but you attacked me anyway because it would make you look good?" Zelgadis snarled.

The man's kindly expression dissolved so fast it was hard to imagine his face was even capable of it. "I wouldn't go that far," he said in a gentle voice that was a lot more ominous than it had been a few seconds ago. "A mazoku, no; but you _are_ a demon."

Zelgadis's vision went red at the edges. He took a step toward the priest, who smiled in that same kind way again.

Then Zelgadis frowned, realising that all of the posturing and insults had distracted him from the material point. "I thought you people were in Ferious."

"Dear boy," the priest said with another gentle smile. "Your friend blew most of our beautiful city sky high, so we relocated it. Certainly, it's not quite finished yet, but I expect I'll be able to find the right sort of people to move on in sooner or later..." He looked around with a satisfied expression. "This city _is_ Ferious."

Zelgadis did not know any human sorcerer who could recreate a city in the space of about a week from scratch. Even if somebody could construct that sort of thing with a trans-dimensional summoning ritual or something, he or she would hit a stumbling block in terms of sheer power. Unless he or she had a passive source of power to use.

A niggling feeling rose in the back of Zelgadis's mind. Perhaps Xellos had sent him in _exactly_ the right direction. The next time he saw the mazoku bastard, Zelgadis was going to thank him.

With a sledgehammer.

* * *

This chapter was more or less brought to you by Piole. The year's almost over, so Happy Non-Denominational Year-End Celebrations. I would say "summer", but I as I was typing that, I realised that not everybody typically spends their Christmas season moaning like a demented animal under a 38-degree Australian sun. Amazing.


	15. The Face

Okay, yes, I am now making a conscious effort to finish this story. We'll see how long that lasts. Although! The next chapter has _already been written._ Can you believe it?

See first chapter for disclaimer.

* * *

When Lina and Gourry had realised that there was no food in the city, the cries of despair had been very audible, and trailed off into a low moan of hunger. It did not escape Lina's notice that the city appeared to have no inhabitants at all – she knew that she hadn't scared them off. She'd only been there a few minutes, and done nothing scarier than running up the street, competing with Gourry to reach the closest inn.

But when they got there, it was completely empty. There were bottles of alcohol lining the shelves, but they were empty, old and dusty, with stained and peeling labels and the occasional crack. Everything looked worn and well broken-in, but there was just... nothing there.

She snapped out of her haze of hunger-madness to look around, deeply suspicious. Gourry started gnawing her boot. She kicked him off with a grunt and a sigh. What was going on?

"Hey, Lina... doesn't this place look kind of familiar?" Gourry wondered, peering around.

Lina blinked. "Does it?" she muttered, and knew better than to ask Gourry for any elaboration. Likely it would take her twenty minutes just to explain the question. But as she looked around, her eyes narrowed. It _did_ seem familiar.

She put a finger to her forehead, closing her eyes in concentration. "Where...?"

She heard the noises of movement as Gourry went to inspect the kitchen, and she let him because she knew what he'd find there: nothing at all. A moment later, her eyes snapped open. "Gourry, get out of there," she called calmly. "We're in Ferious."

He poked his head out of the kitchen. "Ferious?"

She glowered at him and grabbed him by the collar, hauling him toward the door. "That place with all of the stupid priests. It shouldn't be here. We're _miles_ away from where Ferious... well, where Ferious was. Something fishy's going on here!" The door closed behind them and they stepped back onto the street.

Twelve gleaming eyes greeted them. Priests and priestesses, garbed all in black and clutching staves, slim daggers, and the occasional talisman, looked at them with glowing blue eyes.

"We-ell," said Lina slowly. Gourry recognised a fight when one presented itself so obviously, and he drew his newly-enchanted sword with an ominous and steely rasp.

Then Lina smiled. "I thought we'd be running into you again," she said, unfazed by the group they were facing.

"You did?"

"Sure," she said, flipping her bloody-red hair, because this was child's play, and she _was_ a beautiful sorcery genius, after all. "The way they came after us when we left Ferious was a dead giveaway that they were acting under somebody else's control."

"Eh?" Gourry glanced at her. "You can tell that just from that?"

"Of course," she said. "No human runs toward certain death without a very good reason – and these priests had, what, the supposition that I might have been travelling with a demon at some stage?"

"Didn't you blow up their –"

"ANYWAY," Lina yelled over him, hitting him over the head, "I was right."

"I guess so," Gourry said, looking at her curiously, as though such long-term thoughts were well and truly out of his league. She supposed they sort of were.

"Piece of cake. Well, that's what I'd like to say," she added in a lower voice, "but we still have to get out of this."

"That's _my_ cue," Gourry said, smiling when he realised he was finally going to be able to do what he did best. "_Light, come forth!_"

* * *

"You're not human," Zelgadis said flatly, and then cursed himself because there was no way to get out of this now. If he'd played dumb... He took a deep breath. He hadn't. He'd just have to deal with the consequences.

"You're right, of course." The priest patted one wall fondly. "No human could do this."

"That's right. So, you're a mazoku too," he said it with a cynical sort of smile, but he knew he was in trouble. Even lesser mazoku were seriously resistant to his own brand of shamanist magic, and for this one to be passing so closely for human he had to be pretty far up the power chain. Where the hell was Lina?

"My plans are compromised by you knowing that," said the priest seriously, and he straightened and stepped forth, so that the staff looked less like an affectation and more like a weapon. "It was all worked out," he sighed, and Zelgadis felt a thin hope that the man – mazoku – was about to make the oldest mistake in the book and explain his villainous plan in great detail.

But he didn't. Instead, he shook his head sadly and levelled the staff at Zelgadis. "Time to die, demon."

Well, there was only one thing for it. Zelgadis drew his sword, readied a spell in one hand, and smiled grimly. "Let's find out."

For a moment they were still, the bloody rays of the dying sun burning brightly against the edge of Zelgadis's blade, Zelgadis's breathing the only noise.

Then, just like that, dirt shifted underfoot, the reflected light from the sword wavered, and Zelgadis sprang. The binding circle flashed up around him moments too late, its chill magic sliding off him like water.

An energy bolt flew toward him from the tip of the staff, directed almost lazily, but he had expected that. Mazoku tended to favour the stand-back-and-fire approach, in his experience, (except perhaps Xellos, who seemed to favour stabbing things while they weren't expecting it and giggling at their pain).

Zelgadis dodged to one side, feet hitting the ground too fast to follow as he changed directions and launched himself back at the mazoku in a burst of inhuman speed. He was silhouetted large against the wall and its peeling advertisements as the energy bolt hit a house some distance behind him, taking it out in a blaze of light and fire and hot, dusty wind.

The mazoku was taken by surprise at the idea that anything was willing to launch itself at him so recklessly. He met the swing of Zelgadis's sword with his staff. Close up, Zelgadis could see it was not just a walking implement: the staff was carved with three narrow, spiky runes that he could not read, but which made him feel unaccountably nervous and afraid.

The pressure behind his swing faltered as he looked at the runes, and then he was flying back through the air, his heavy body crashing through something made of dry wood. The noises of splintering overpowered his senses for a moment, and then he was buried in broken wood and dirt and the occasional arachnid, pissed off by the disturbance but not stupid enough to try biting through the rocks in his skin.

_Ow_, Zelgadis thought. He'd landed on one of the support beams of the house. There was a nail sticking up out of something about an inch from his eye. His legs were tangled in the wood. He inhaled slowly, and smelled old dirt, wood and a fait scent of blood. Probably nothing serious. It rarely was, for him.

"Oh, come on, demon," the mazoku sighed, and he fancied he could hear him rolling his eyes. "You don't think I'd believe you were seriously injured by a love-tap like that?"

A love-tap? The mental image that gave Zelgadis was uninspiring to say the least. But the priest had a point. He shoved a few planks aside and stood up, disregarding the way his cloak ripped, caught up in the debris as it was. Really, as cool as they looked and as warm as they were for travelling, cloaks were kind of a liability in a fight.

The mazoku flinched and ducked when Zelgadis hurled one of the planks of wood at him, and the words were tumbling from his lips, "_...smash the abyssal darkness apart,_" and then he was racing forward, muscles burning, "_Elmekia flame!_"

The world turned white for one blinding moment, and there was a hiss of pain from the other man, but he could tell without looking that the spell wouldn't stop him. Zelgadis took a deep breath and began the chant for his next spell. No short cuts, he had to concentrate – despite being rather good at it when he tried, black magic was not Zelgadis's specialty.

But still the wind picked up with the force of gathering magic and the light of the previous spell faded and he finished the next one, growling, "_Dynast Bras!_"

Lightning fell around the mazoku in a shining pentagram, crackled, and sped toward him without pause.

The light and magic faded, and Zelgadis breathed heavily, pulse hammering with adrenalin and excitement and aggression. The feelings left a corrosive, metallic tang between his teeth.

Then Zelgadis felt all of those heady, powerful chemicals in his blood turn to icy fear in about half a second. His sweat tasted salty. His blood rushed in his ears.

The mazoku had not only survived, but he was completely, totally unharmed. His robes weren't even singed. He smiled a little then and said, "That's a bit more like it, demon."

Zelgadis swallowed painfully. This was not a promising start. But he gamely bared his teeth, because surely he didn't need Lina and her overkill black magic to come to his rescue every goddamn time there was a mazoku handy.

He then realised that his sword was buried somewhere in the debris, but he wasn't about to turn his back on the other man to collect it, so he was stuck with just his hands and his own magic. It would have to be enough. He growled low.

"My, my, I thought I heard some kind of disturbance up here!" Xellos's annoying laughter echoed in the deserted street.

The (other, less welcome) mazoku looked around, trying to source the voice, and finally spotted Xellos perched atop the roof of a temple to Cephied, kicking his legs idly as he watched the proceedings.

"How long have you been there?" Zelgadis demanded.

"Not so long, Zelgadis-san," Xellos said defensively. "You don't think I'd leave you to fight a horrible, evil mazoku all on your own, do you?"

"Because that's never happened before," he drawled.

Although to be absolutely, technically honest, which Zelgadis was not predisposed to being, Xellos was usually good for _some_ sort of helpful intervention when there were other mazoku present – as long as he hadn't buggered off at the first sign of danger at all. However, Zelgadis suspected that this was because most other mazoku were Xellos's enemies by default.

"Why, Zelgadis. I'm shocked at you. Shocked." Xellos landed lightly on his toes.

The other mazoku watched him warily for a moment, and then stepped back. "As amusing as it would be to turn the pair of you into filthy smears on the ground, I have to decline for the minute. Don't worry," he added with another of those disconcertingly kindly smiles, "You won't have time to miss me."

And then he was gone.

Zelgadis relaxed, and then flopped to the dirt. "Ow," he said, located the source of the blood-smell – his left calf. He hadn't even felt the damage when it happened, too high on adrenalin to feel much of anything. He certainly felt it now, grimacing as he applied a weak recovery spell to it.

"That was interesting," Xellos said, leaning against his staff.

"I wasn't aware it was a spectator sport," Zelgadis growled.

Xellos looked at him, but said nothing and then shrugged. "I have to go," he said then.

Zelgadis looked up with a raised eyebrow, but Xellos was gone. Probably reporting back to that madwoman he worked for. In itself this was as much a relief as the fight ending. He licked his lips.

"Zel!" Lina was racing toward him. It looked as though she was wearing red gloves, but on closer inspection, he realised that her own gloves had been thoroughly coated in blood. Other people's, he hoped.

He lifted one hand to them in a wave. "Hey," said Gourry as they came to a stop, "This place is kind of wrecked. Did you get into a fight, too, Zelgadis?"

Lina bopped him and turned back to Zel. "We got attacked by a bunch of those priests – the Padre guys. I figured it out, they're being controlled by something."

"Really," said Zelgadis dryly, levering himself to his feet. "I'd assume that the mazoku posing as one of them would be responsible for that."

"Mazo..." Lina scowled. "Great! Just _great_. More mazoku. Just when I thought it was all going to be fine and the problem was a real, honest-to-god human for a change – ARRRGH!" She waved one arm at random and hit Gourry in the forehead, leaving a bloody smear on his face. He wiped it off on the back of his hand, inspecting it carefully.

"You think this is edible?"

"By definition, yes," said Zelgadis.

They both watched Gourry lick at the blood for a moment before scrunching up his nose at the taste and ignoring it.

"I should have thought that through," said Zelgadis after a pause.

Lina blinked and turned back to him. "So, what kind of mazoku are we talking about?" she asked, all business.

"Well, he wasn't affected by any of my spells, and I couldn't get a hit on him," Zelgadis said sourly, walking back to the debris that had been a house. He shoved bits and pieces of wood aside until he found his sword, which was, of course, rather badly notched by the staff. "And he has a staff with some kind of magical carvings on it," he added.

"What a coincidence," sighed Lina.

* * *

I'll post the next bit after a couple of reviews, because if I don't get those then I feel like maybe nobody's reading my story at all. I'm not trying to force you to respond. I'm just saying, if I don't think anybody's reading, I'm still going to write it for my own fun, but I'm probably going to be awfully slow to share it with my invisible audience. Happy holidays, duckies!


	16. The Plan

Hello again~ I come back and here are all of these delightful reviews. Thank you for letting me know you're still reading. XD

See first chapter for disclaimer.

* * *

Amelia stared at the nothingness around her dully. There was nothing here at all, just blackness and her, and she didn't feel so good. She cramped up painfully at the slightest movement, and nausea and confusion were her default states. Occasionally, she started to bleed from beneath her nails, or her mouth, or similar.

She had the horrible feeling that she was rotting from the inside. She didn't know, of course, and she couldn't quite justify it to herself intellectually, but it was a gelid premonition in her gut: she'd stand up one day (when she could stand again, perhaps) and her skin would split and all of her necrotic organs would spill forth and she would stare at them as they steamed on the floor (which was nothing, like the walls) and think: _Well, shit_.

But it hadn't happened yet. She was hopeful. She was optimistic.

She bit her hands and cried and hoped that the pain would stop sometime soon.

"You are the most boring human I have ever had to babysit," sighed Dog, looking at her reproachfully. Of course, the number of humans he had ever had to babysit was nearing two, if you included that delightfully resentful chimera as being 'human'. He'd poked her, he'd prodded her. He'd yelled. He'd even gnawed on her foot briefly. But she couldn't see him, and she couldn't feel him, and she couldn't hear him, and she just curled up tighter and cried harder.

He sighed a doggy sigh. He had his orders, and it wasn't as though they were hard or terribly onerous, but even delicious pain and fear grew boring, when you were indecently glutted on the stuff.

* * *

"Okay, this is definitely our guy," Lina was saying, having eaten her fill at the nearest inn. The food had started good, but as the ingredients dwindled and the cooks became increasingly alarmed, the quality took a sharp downturn until they were eating old, greasy meat covered in eye-watering amounts of salt and chilli to hide the stale flavour. None of them really cared. It had been way too long since their last meal.

Lina and Gourry had eaten themselves sick, thrown up, and then promptly returned for more, which Zelgadis supposed he ought to have expected. He was content, after the first rush, to pick at the food on his plate – which was taboo, on penalty of death, to either of his companions. Not that this stopped them, generally speaking, so he just made sure their table was piled high with food at all times so they didn't have any reason to steal his.

"As much as I'd like to get my hands on this staff of his, I think he's too dangerous; so next time we see him, you two distract him while I get ready to cast a dragon slave, and then we'll see how it goes from there," she picked at a chicken bone that had not quite been gnawed clean.

Zelgadis nodded, privately thinking that a dragon slave wouldn't do it, if the mazoku had not even been affected by the frozen lord's spell. He sipped as she spoke, surprised to discover that the coffee wasn't half bad.

"Ahhh, I'm afraid that just won't do, Lina-san," Xellos said apologetically, about three inches from Zelgadis's left ear. His breath tickled. Zel leapt like a startled cat, swearing as his coffee spread across the table.

Lina raised her eyebrows, apparently unfazed by his abrupt appearance.

"You see," he said, as though her aplomb was entirely anticipated, "You're going to need the staff to cure Amelia. Or, well, I suppose you could go back and ask Dolphin nicely..."

"I thought you said it would wear off!" Zelgadis protested, snatching Xellos's collar.

"It's not wearing off." Xellos shrugged. "It's your decision, Lina-san."

The redhead narrowed her eyes. "I think it's time we got to see Amelia," she said suspiciously. "No offense, but I don't trust you _or_ your master half as far as I could throw you."

"None taken," he smiled. "Self-preservation is an excellent motivator. But you don't have a choice, Lina-san," he added with a note of apology – wholly feigned, if Zelgadis was any judge. "I can't take you to her. She is, of course, still safe enough... but for how long, I couldn't say."

"Xellos..." Lina's low growl was very ominous.

He smiled nervously and spread his hands wide. "Needs must, I'm afraid," he said philosophically.

She scowled and gnawed one nail. "This doesn't seem..." _Like you_, Zelgadis thought she was going to say, but she trailed off because, of course, none of them really knew Xellos at all. "If something bad happens to Amelia before we get that staff back, I'm holding _you_ personally responsible, mister," she said instead.

"Lina-san! That's hardly fair. _I_ didn't poison Amelia!"

"Because you're so fond of fairness," Zelgadis drawled, sipping his coffee.

Xelos pouted. "Maa. I suppose there's nothing I can do, then," he said.

"Damn right," said the sorceress. "Now! Xellos! Where's this guy located?" she demanded. "We're going to go beat some sense into him," she cracked her knuckles and smiled darkly.

Xellos's smile was eerily similar. "I can't help you with the mazoku – we have ways of hiding from one another, of course – but the staff is..." he tilted his head and then produced a little square of cardboard from nowhere in particular.

Lina accepted it from his hand and Zelgadis caught a glimpse of the calligraphy as it was transferred. It was an address. "This seems unusually straightforward for you," she said to him suspiciously, fanning herself with the card.

Xellos tilted his head. "I want to meet that mazoku as much as you do, Lina-san. It motivates me to be cooperative."

"Yes, I can see how problematic it could be if your meat shields weren't with you when you arrived."

"You're not really a meat shield, Zelgadis." He flicked a rock on Zel's face with one finger. Zelgadis drew back, annoyed. "You're... I don't know. A granite shield, I suppose?" he frowned curiously at Zel, as though he was trying hard to figure it out.

Zelgadis ignored this, and Xellos got to live.

"Anyway," Lina interrupted, getting to her feet. "We've eaten our fill now, so it's time to kick some evil mazoku arse."

"Right!" Agreed Gourry. He hadn't understood a lot of the previous discussion, but this was a sentiment he could get behind.

Zelgadis was less enthusiastic about meeting the monster again. After all, who knew how powerful he was? Theoretically, Xellos should be able to deal with anybody outside of Shabranigdu's generals with a certain degree of efficiency – if the mazoku decided to join in the fighting at all – but now with the power of Dolphin's enchanted staff as well, this new threat could be a very serious danger.

Zelgadis scowled down into his coffee. As though run of the mill, lesser mazoku weren't enough trouble.

Lina wasn't taking this seriously enough, he thought as he followed her and Gourry out of the inn, levitating into the sky and ignoring the enraged shrieks of the tavern owner below. Wouldn't be the first time they'd skipped out on paying a bill.

"Don't look now, Lina-san, but it seems he has a crossbow."

"Ghk!"

* * *

The address Xellos had given led them to a rundown house in the centre of the ghost-city, more or less identical to the other houses around it. There were no real signs of crumbling decay – merely that the hosue showed signs of normal wear and tear long neglected: cracked glass, peeling paint, damaged mortar.

They headed in uninvited. "Hello!" Lina bellowed. "Prie-est-san!"

"Indoor voice, please," murmured the priest himself, coming out from one of the side-rooms. He had a cup of tea which he was holding negligently by the saucer. "Well," he said then. "Can I help you?"

Zelgadis noted that he was leaning on the staff and frowned. They were going to have to figure out how to get that thing away from him sometime soon – very soon, he thought, imagining Amelia's present state. If she was lucid, she was probably very confused, a little afraid and full of righteous indignation.

If he'd known what her actual state was at that moment, heaven and hell would not have kept him from taking that staff.

"We'd like that staff you've got there, please," said Lina sweetly, scuffing the floor with a shoe as she twirled her hair around her finger.

"...No," said the mazoku.

Her little-girl act dissolved entirely. "Okay then," she shrugged. "Gourry! Zel!"

They sprang into action at her command, swords sliding free of sheathes, feet thumping the marble floor as they charged in time.

At the last moment, Zelgadis feinted and stepped behind Gourry. The blond lunged, struck with a steely ring and staggered as his blow was easily countered. From behind him, Zelgadis took the lead then, drawing forth astral power, "_Rah tilt!_"

The blue-white light of his spirit flooded the room and everybody flinched. The mazoku cursed under the onslaught, and Zelgadis and Gourry got out of the way as Lina finished her incantation: "—_BY THE POWER THAT YOU AND I POSSESS_—"

The next two words were drowned out in the sounds of large-scale, unnecessary and violent destruction. The stone floor of the house seemed almost to dissolve as the black magic took over the area. Metal crumpled. Stone crumbled. Wood splintered. The sheer energy of the blast kicked up a ferocious wind that sent hot chips of wood and stone streaming away from the site.

When the awesome chaos had finished, Zelgadis, Lina, Gourry and Xellos were left looking at a very large crater. In the middle was a slightly singed but very much intact staff.

"Well, then," said Lina, skipping on down through the rubble and debris to collect. Gourry scrambled after her. Zelgadis watched on, suspicious. If the mazoku could take the dynast bras spell that easily, he should not have caved so quickly to a dragon slave.

Lina jerked out of reach, quick on her feet as the mazoku rematerialised, his bony hands wrapped around the staff. He still held his teacup, and Zelgadis's stomach twisted horribly in sudden understanding. The mazoku smiled as he hurled the liquid into Lina's face.

It turned black on her skin. She brought her hands up, scratching at it, but it had reached the consistency of cold molasses. Gourry yelled something as he raced toward her while the mazoku held out one hand, light glowing brightly in his palm. Lina wavered, blinking under the influence of whatever enchantment was in the liquid.

Gourry wasn't going to make it. Zelgadis blurred into motion, muscles burning with effort, but he wasn't going to make it either. He might be just fast enough to catch her, but –

"Tsk, tsk, tsk..." Xellos got there first, shimmering into existence between Lina and the mazoku. He touched a gloved fingertip to his lips, and then wagged it chidingly at the other mazoku.

Xellos's eyes glittered bright and purple and very inhuman. The mazoku met his gaze and hesitated for a single, vital split-second.

Gourry slammed into him from one side, a streak of blond hair and steel. His sword made a familiar and unique sound as it sheared through the faux-flesh of the mazoku.

"Lina," Zelgadis came to a halt next to Lina, who was staring stupidly at the muck on her fingers. She blinked at him in a daze. "Lina!"

He reached out gingerly and clasped her shoulder, then shook her gently.

"Don't bother," Xellos said flatly. "We'll need the staff."

Zelgadis did not even notice the change of pronoun at the time. "You could have helped earlier!"

"Can't let you get complacent, Zelgadis-san," said the priest, and then he shifted away through the astral plane.

Zelgadis felt oddly unsafe without him between the staff-wielding mazoku and himself. Zelgadis was used to feeling unsafe, so that wasn't what was odd: it was that Xellos had made him feel unthreatened by the very real danger they were in.

It had been a throwaway comment, a little obnoxious and tasteless remark to distract him, but Zelgadis thought maybe he was right: they _were_ getting complacent if he thought Xellos was there to help. He scowled.

Lina sighed and sank slowly to the ground. Her head slumped forward, drooping so her chin nearly touched her chest. Zelgadis frowned briefly, but left her. The danger was not with Lina, not right now. He looked to Gourry, who grunted with effort as his newly-enchanted sword clashed again with Dolphin's staff. The mazoku was a deal stronger, Zel supposed. He prepared another spell and dashed toward the fray, ready to give Gourry a break for a few moments at least.

But as he closed in, the mazoku looked up, smiled, and disappeared.

Gourry stopped.

Zelgadis slowed to a jog, and then to a walk.

The blond looked at him in confusion for a few minutes, and then memory dawned and he raced back toward the figure kneeling in the crater. "_Lina!_"

Zelgadis cautiously felt out on the astral plane, but there was no sense of the mazoku they'd been fighting. He scowled. Xellos was gone when he actually had the potential to be remotely useful, Lina was poisoned, and their enemy was still out there somewhere. In short, Murphy's Law was ubiquitous, and had left Zelgadis to stand amid the crumbling ruins of their plan with a dry voice in his mind commenting, _how unusual._

* * *

I don't know what I'd do if I let any of them catch a break. Tell me your thoughts about this chapter.


	17. The Tiny Hitch In The Plan

Hello. I can't believe it's been so long since I updated. I am really shit at this remembering-my-fics thing. I apologise. But welcome to chapter 17, those of you who are still with me and who have not been horrified away by my inability to keep to any kind of schedule. : D

See first chapter for disclaimer.

* * *

They trekked from the site of several serious explosions all the way back to the smaller, less dangerously illusory village they'd been in before. It was astonishing how few people seemed to notice that they were living next door to a ghost town run by a Mazoku. Cynically, Zelgadis wondered if they'd even care.

He was having a very, very bad week, and couldn't help but count off his list of mental grievances as he and Gourry trudged in silence: Xellos, with whom he had beyond all horror, depravity and common sense had sexual intercourse; Amelia, who was down for the count and getting worse; Xellos, who was stalking him; Lina, now more or less in the same situation as Amelia; Xellos, who kept kissing him; rain, for being stupid and wet; and Rezo, because he still wasn't human.

He was willing to blame the staff-stealing Mazoku for 95% of the above grievances, and so thoughts of ripping his face off and feeding it to werewolves were in the forefront of Zelgadis's mind as he walked.

At least Lina had fallen immediately unconscious. Zelgadis had no illusions that she would be as easy to subdue as Amelia had been.

Gourry carried her gently. They carefully avoided the establishment where they'd eaten, and it surprised Zelgadis not at all when their light drizzle turned into a downpour with a sky-splitting roar. It matched his mood.

He had a great deal of difficulty convincing the innkeeper to allow him to stay, which did not make him any more cheerful.

"You know what," he said finally, tugging his scarf down, much to the man's horror. "If you give me the room for free I won't eat your family. How does that sound?" he slapped him companionably on the shoulder with a stone hand.

The innkeeper acquiesced with a whimper, and Zelgadis stormed up to their assigned rooms with a distracted Gourry in tow.

He had not been relying on Gourry to be the brains of the operation, but now the blond sat and stared at Lina's supine form on the bedcovers of their room while rain streaked the flawed windowpanes. He touched her hair roughly every three hundred heart beats. Zelgadis could not hold his attention for long. Hell, food could not even command as much of it as usual: he ate indifferently, staring at Lina.

Meanwhile, Zelgadis tried to think. He began sitting by the darkened, rain-streaked window, trying to come up with a way to defeat a high level Mazoku on a deadline, and without Lina's overkill black magic. He already knew that the strongest spells in his repetoir had next to no effect on the mysterious Mazoku. The Sword of Light, maybe...

But they didn't _have_ the Sword of Light, and no matter how proud Lina was of the enchantment on Gourry's new weapon, it was really no substitute. What was?

He rapped his fingertips on the windowsill and scowled powerfully out at the pitch darkness. Behind him, he could hear some small movement from Gourry.

They could summon a more powerful Mazoku to defeat him, but it seemed likely to Zel that they would then have to take the staff from _that_ Mazoku, which was most definitely counter-productive - and besides, there was no good way to tell how powerful he was, with that staff.

"Think," he muttered to himself. There was no Lina. There was no Sword of Light. Zelgadis stood up and began to pace.

What would he have done before he'd become Lina's lackey?

In the end, the answer was obvious.

"Stay here. Don't let anyone in. Protect Lina," he said on his way out the door. Gourry returned his nod with serious blue eyes.

* * *

"Never heard of him," Xellas admitted. She was evidently feeling lonely, because Xellos was kneeling right beside her throne, and she was playing with his hair. But this was not the sort of thing a good servant noticed, much as he hadn't noticed that this fit of tactile attention coincided with Luna-san being out of town.

She shook her head after a short moment, blond locks fluttering around her shoulders. "There's no point confronting him directly. Take the staff from them when they've retrieved it and bring it to me. My sister will pay dearly for a chunk of her power to be returned to her, and she doesn't have the mental capacity to take the long-term view."

"Yes, Xellas-sama," he said, which was pretty much how he answered everything.

"You will have to step in if it seems the chimera won't get the staff in time, though," she mused. "Amelia's expendable. Lina-san, not so much."

Xellos nodded again, and she patted his head like an obedient dog.

"And what about Zelgadis-san?" she wondered aloud. "Zelgadis-san, Zelgadis-san," she tapped her chin with one manicured fingernail, eyeing her servant's face as she pondered.

Xellos did not venture an opinion.

"Oh, don't look so worried," she said cheerfully, even though he looked nothing of the sort. That sort of thing did not count, with Xellas. "Do you think he can do it?" she asked.

Xellos shifted under her hand. He didn't hesitate. "No. He can't."

She laughed. "Well, he's not of much interest to me, anyway. Keep an eye out for any developments. Have a cookie," she added abruptly. She gestured to the plate that had definitely not been there a moment ago.

Xellos accepted one of the cookies. Xellas watched anxiously as he chewed it.

"Well?"

It tasted kind of like burned milk and fungus. He swallowed. "It's delicious," he said, because even if you weren't supposed to lie to your master, some things were necessary.

She beamed at him. "You're such a nice boy. Just for that, I won't ask you what your interest in the chimera really stems from."

Because she hadn't asked, he didn't say.

Xellas heaved a sigh, her mind back on business. "Let's just hope Dynast doesn't manage to get involved," she muttered. "Go on, go on," she disentangled her hand from his dark hair and gestured him away. "You can get back to stalking Zelgadis now."

Although he might have argued the term 'stalking', he respectfully bowed and went quietly.

He did not go all that far. Instead of returning immediately to his healthy hobby which was definitely probably not stalking, Xellos checked up on Amelia.

"I don't know how she's doing," said The Dog, his bright tail flicking lazily. "You said to watch her. I'm watching."

After a quick examination, it became quite apparent that Amelia was... not herself. "How long has she been so... unresponsive?"

The Dog yawned, snapping his big teeth shut. "A couple of days."

Xellos just smiled. "Oh, well! I'm sure Zelgadis will get the staff before anything permenant happens."

"Stone-boy?" The Dog wondered, tilting his head. One ear flopped sideways. "If you say so," he said, dubiously.

* * *

With Lina unconscious under Gourry's obsessive but helpless gaze, Zelgadis did not have time to do what he truly would have preferred - a course of action that would have meant heading to the library and researching delicious leatherbound tomes until his eyeballs fell out - so instead he went to the temple deep inside the reconstructed city of Ferious.

It was the only place that was actually inhabited, and Zelgadis did not bother being stealthy when he went in.

Spellfire crackled, and Zelgadis moved quickly through, eliminating the threat of the priests and priestesses well before any organised response could be managed. Without the element of surprise, even the high-level priests could do nothing better than shield and throw spells meant to kill low-level Mazoku.

Since Zel was neither low-level nor really a Mazoku, he cleared out the temple quickly.

Some searching revealed that the priests had a store room, filled with records, ledgers and endless bits of trash to round out the knowledge sealed up in the more interesting of their books. Zelgadis ransacked this room with abandon.

It wasn't as though this was a really unusual activity for Zelgadis, what with his habitual pillaging of old temples and laboratories for stores of magical knowledge; but now he operated more with a sense of frenzied urgency than hopeful excitement.

The priests, he was convinced, _did_ have a way to capture Mazoku, or they wouldn't have been around for so long. He scrambled through their dusty religious scrolls and old bits and pieces of charms with blood still on his hands.

He found a promising scroll, cleared off a table with a sweep of his arm and a clatter, and slumped into the seat there to pore over its contents. It contained, first, a number of rituals that required certain lunar conditions so he could piggyback his power on the moon. After a few rough calculations, he knew that they were nowhere near either solstice and the possibility of a lunar eclipse was very slim.

The next spell was a little more promising, although he didn't know where he was going to get the key ingredients. Some of them, like the bones and the carved symbols for placement, he could find in the temple - but how he was going to get the blood of a Greater Mazoku, he had no idea.

After all, if he could cut the bastard, he wouldn't be sitting here squinting at this bloody text.

But the rest of the spell, he could do that. Well, him and Gourry, since he'd need somebody to hold down the northern point and it couldn't be him. But Gourry had plenty of force to his spirit, even if he'd never be able to consciously control it.

And then all they'd need was to be very lucky.

He scowled at the scroll, then rolled it up and shoved it down his shirt before heading back through the empty temple - picking his way around the twitching bodies on the ground - and into the black storm.

He did not know _how_ he was going to get the blood, but he certainly knew where.

Now he just had to wait for Xellos to show up again. That seemed likely to be sooner rather than later.

He broke into a jog as he headed back toward the small village they were based in.

"I have a spell," he told Gourry when he re-entered their room of the village's best (and only) inn. At least, he thought, surveying the room, nothing had gone disastrously wrong here.

The blond was hunched over, back to the door, watching Lina. He didn't respond.

"Gourry," Zelgadis said, a bit more firmly.

He turned around, but his face was a grey mask of old skin.

His eye sockets were empty and something inside him was buzzing spitefully. An ant crawled over his jaw and between his slack lips.

"Zel?" said the creature. A clump of something fell from his empty eye socket. It looked like part of a punctured balloon. "I'm glad you made it back. I took care of her like you said," he said, and gestured to the bed.

Zelgadis's stomach lurched.

Lina's ribcage glinted in the candlelight.

Gourry was still talking, but Zel couldn't hear him over the rushing blood in his ears. All he could smell was raw meat.

Then, thinking that this was beginning to be an unpleasant running gag, he lost consciousness.

* * *

That's it for 17, but don't worry! 18 is in the works. It is! I swear! Love and kisses to all of you.

As a note, I'm sorry about my weird scene breaks in, you know, every earlier chapter. _ I use abiword, and I'm beginning to think that doesn't like it or something. Or maybe I'm just doing something wrong! I guess I'll try converting to rtf or doc in future and see how that works out. : D


	18. The Deal

Oh, my. Wasn't that quick. : D

See first chapter for disclaimer.

* * *

When Zelgadis woke up, the room slid and slipped into cautious colour, and for a second he had no idea how much time had passed. Not very much, he suspected, but Gourry and Lina were nowhere to be found.

There was a note on pricey vellum left on his chest. Awkwardly, he squinted at it.

_Chimera-san,_

_What were you thinking, threatening the innkeeper like that? Maybe you should have lit a beacon, instead. _

Of course, he thought, feeling stupid and hopeless and angry all at the same time. The innkeeper would have gone straight to Ferious to have somebody deal with the demon threatening his family. He swallowed down the bile in his mouth and read on.

_I hope you enjoyed my little illusion. I know I enjoyed its results. Allow its implications to dissuade you from continued confrontation with me, and we will part as indifferent acquaintances. _

_Wishing you nothing at all, _

_M_

His first thought was, rather naturally, _Xellos you bastard_, but after a second he had to assume that his correspondant was probably not Xellos. For a start, Xellos would not have bothered hiding his identity under a false initial.

That, and the illusion hadn't really been Xellos's style. It was still fresh and graphic in Zelgadis's mind, so much so that he could almost smell the raw meat that had been most of Lina's internal organs.

Allow it to dissuade him? He scowled at the note.

"Ah... are you taking a nap, Zelgadis-san?" Something wooden bumped into the top of his head. Repeatedly.

_That_ was Xellos.

Xellos moved on to poking him in the shoulder with the end of his staff, a rather gentle parody of how he'd attacked Val the last time they'd all been in a mess together. Once the memory had taken hold, Zelgadis couldn't get the noise of Valgarv's screaming out of his head. He smacked the staff away and rolled to his feet.

"They're gone," he scowled, looking around the dark corners of the room to be certain.

"Amazing!" Xellos covered his mouth with one hand. His gloves were sort of bluish off-white, a colour that really didn't seem to match the rest of his clothing. It irritated Zelgadis. Actually, pretty much everything irritated Zelgadis.

He glowered, distracted by this response. "What is amazing?"

"Well, nothing, but you said 'they're gone' with such _feeling! _It just seemed like it would be rude not to respond," Xellos suggested cheerfully.

"I really, really hate you."

"It's a temporary state," Xellos grinned.

"I don't think so, no," said Zelgadis. "Who the hell is 'M', anyway? I don't recall pissing off a Mazoku whose name begins with M - not a live one, anyway..." he muttered, remembering that hideous purple thing who had stolen Lina's magic away.

"Well, you do tend to kill them when you meet them," Xellos laughed his obnoxious laughter.

"Are you here to help or not?" Zelgadis asked flatly.

"Hmm," Xellos tapped his chin meditatively. "I suppose I could be persuaded to help," he smiled, batting his eyelashes.

"Forget it," Zel growled. "You think you can tell me you don't have a stake in this?"

"Oh! No, I would of course be very interested to see how this little conflict resolves itself," Xellos admitted, "But all I have to do is sit around and watch - after all, you're the one who's working to a deadline, aren't you, Zelgadis-san? You wouldn't want anything to happen to Amelia, after all."

Amelia. She must be in bad shape by now. Zelgadis took a deep breath. "I found a spell," he said. "One that the priests were using. I think it was the one the Mazoku used on me, when he was pretending to be human."

"That would be very unhealthy for him, using human magic," Xellos mused, "Tsk, tsk."

"Yes, his health is of such concern to me," Zelgadis drawled.

He rubbed his forehead, looking around at the room again. It seemed empty and surreal, hardly even there with its bland wooden furniture and all-important lack of friends.

"So, this spell?" Xellos prompted, but Zelgadis was watching him with narrowed eyes.

"Wait a second, Xellos," he said slowly, "_you_ need Lina."

"Hmm," Xellos tilted his head. "Even if you assume that's true, can you really assume I need her in one piece? - And what about Amelia! It would be a lot easier following you all without random bursts of Amelia's personality obstructing the view from the Astral plane," he sniffed.

Zelgadis clenched his jaw. It might have been benign enough in another situation, but Amelia was in real danger. He glowered at the priest, whose smile became marginally wider. "But," he went on implacably, "you _do_ need Lina in one piece, if you want her to do something for you. And you wouldn't have been following us if you didn't want her to do something for you ...just like the first time."

"Mou... I wonder. You sound a little bit put out, Zelgadis-san. Would you be offended, if I was just following you around for Lina-san's sake?"

"No!" Zelgadis snapped with an ugly flush across his stone cheeks.

Xellos leaned in close, too close, well into Zel's personal space, until it would have been more natural to be touching each other. His thick hair shadowed his eyes, which glinted oddly in the light. They shared air in a too-warm rush of breath, and Zelgadis wondered why he even pretended to need to breathe. But he didn't back away. "I think you might be selling yourself short, Zel-san. You have many of your own charms, after all."

"Whatever," said Zelgadis. "I don't have time to stand around arguing with you. The spell needs your blood."

Xellos's eyebrows rose. "My blood?" he repeated, although Zelgadis got the feeling he wasn't really that surprised. His smile narrowed into something a little more sincere, and a lot more dangerous. "And how did you anticipate getting that, Zelgadis-san?"

"I don't..." he trailed off, scowling past Xellos's shoulder. The Mazoku did not let him do this for long, sidling into the space where his eyes were focused. "What do you want me to do?"

Xellos bit the tip of his thumb and looked at the ceiling. "Saa... my blood would be very valuable... although calling it 'blood' is sort of misleading. It would have to be something precious to you. Human wizards have _died_ for less powerful components!" He laughed.

Zelgadis didn't answer. He looked away from Xellos, and the grating edge of the priest's laughter lingered hard and flat in the room between them.

After a very long pause, Zelgadis finally sighed, "Cut the crap, Xellos. Is that what you want? You know I won't leave them like this."

"Well, if you _want _to die, Zel-san," Xellos said in a voice that was not entirely friendly.

"Of course I don't want to die!" Zelgadis exploded. "You act like there's something I should know! All I know is you follow me around, steal my manuscripts, drive me crazy, _sleep with me, _humiliate me, _drug _me-" he cut himself off, breathing heavily. "I don't want to die."

Xellos looked, for a man wearing a silly smile and the ugliest bowl cut imaginable, deeply unimpressed. "And you can't think of a _single thing_ that might persuade me in a fair trade."

Zelgadis's stomach commenced a tightly acrobatic tumbling routine. He felt the hot-cold prickle of nervous sweat break out along his stony skin. His mouth was too dry and too wet at the same time, somehow, and there was something stuck in his throat he couldn't quite swallow down. "I don't..." his eyes flicked anywhere but toward Xellos, nervous motions.

Xellos made a long, slow considering sound. "Well, I'll let you think about it, Zel-san. Maybe you'll come up with something, eventually." And he disappeared.

And Zelgadis didn't have _time. _"Xellos! Wait! _Xellos!_"

"Yes?" He reappeared, hovering. His head was tilted slightly, curiously.

"Okay. Okay, we can..." Now nothing felt real at all.

"We can what, Zel?" Xellos blinked at him. "Do you really have this much time?" he wondered.

Zelgadis had the sudden intense feeling that no matter how deeply he breathed, his lungs weren't working.

"We can have sex."

Xellos was silent. Zelgadis breathed faster.

He kept going. "For the blood. We can... we..."

"Hou... Is that what you thought I wanted, Zel-san? How dirty of you!"

Zelgadis felt his face go hot, and he couldn't tell if it was because he was horribly, agonisingly humiliated or because he was having a heart attack. Of course that wasn't what Xellos wanted, they weren't even the same goddamned _species,_ and Zel had just fallen for every stupid ploy of the past week, which was probably the point.

If he called on the earth spirits in just the right way, he might actually be able to melt into the ground. Maybe. But he couldn't melt into the ground just yet. He had to save his friends. Then he could die of humiliation and self-loathing.

"I thought... but..." he stumbled for a few words, and then he swallowed the acidic taste in his mouth and said, "Then I don't know what you want. I just don't."

Xellos hovered a little closer, peering into Zelgadis's face from his superior vantage. His smile was not going anywhere. His feet hit the ground with a gentle tap, and he reached forward to tug on Zel's bangs. "It's okay. I'm willing to accept your gracious offer anyway, Zel-san."

He pressed a hand flat to Zelgadis's chest and gave him a gentle shove. Zelgadis's knees hit the side of the bed Lina had been laying on not so long ago.

Xellos's eyes, half-open, glimmered coolly in the fire light. Zelgadis could feel the slow, urgent contractions all the way up from his stomach to his throat. Xellos nudged him with one knee and, off balance, he dropped to the bed. He looked down at the muted bedcovers between his thighs and all he could see was Lina's ripped-up body. He could almost smell it.

The dark spot on the ground by his foot turned into a monstrous dark stain.

Zel jerked his eyes up to Xellos's sharp-edged little smile. He was actually going to do this. He was going to have sex with the Mazoku. He was going to have sex with the Mazoku. The thought had a muted horror attached to it, the sort that swam down his bloodstream in an icy rush and pooled in his gut.

His heart thundered. He could feel the muscles in his stomach string out hard and wire-tight. The tension changed his breathing.

"I'm sorry," he said, shortly, scrambling to his feet, scrambling past Xellos, to - to where, he didn't know. Window, he thought vaguely, shoving it open.

The night air was freezing even against his skin, but it didn't stop him from throwing up everything in his stomach. Mostly it was coffee, which hurt like all hell coming back up.

He let his head dangle, breathing harder with watering eyes and an acidic sting in his sinuses for a few minutes. He didn't feel any better. His stomach lurched again, but he fought it down. Xellos took him by the back of the shirt and hauled him back into the room, which felt oppressively close and hot now. Zelgadis slumped back on the bed.

Zelgadis wondered if he'd finally managed to mortally offend the Mazoku, and if that would make him stop being a creepy stalker. The thought left him feeling strangely bereft.

Xellos slid the window shut. "Why don't we focus on rescuing Lina-san first," he suggested, a bit drily.

* * *

Look at that! Chapter 18, up! I only have a few more to go. Surely I can make it before this newest tiny window of free time disappears.

**A quick note: **As ever, this wasn't beta-read because I have nobody willing to put up with my ramblings and my ego blocks out the sun, and more importantly because few of my friends are conversant enough with Slayers to want to read a freaking novella. So although I do try to check for the occasional typo and keep everything in continuity, sometimes things slip through. If you see anything really glaring, tell me please. I don't want everybody but me to be laughing at me! That would be _so sad_.

Reviews go somewhere between caffeine and salt in the food pyramid. You don't want me to become malnourished, right? _Right?_ D:


	19. The Black Magic Eggplant

See first chapter for disclaimer.

BREAK

An unusually cooperative Xellos woke up the innkeeper with a cheerful smile and put him to work making coffee and a very, very early breakfast for a poor, underappreciated priest. If Zelgadis had known that he'd intimated having 'the demon' under his full control to achieve this, he might have rebelled.

As it was, he was just numbly horrified that he'd promised to bed the Mazoku in exchange for components for a spell. He sat in his seat and stared at the sticky wood of the taproom table in frank confusion. When had his life become so twisted and warped that it was some giant, unfunny satire?

He tried to figure out when the bad thing had really happened, counting from his formative years onward, but Xellos sat down and handed him a cup of coffee and he just stared at this strange creature that was Xellos being considerate. Then he decided to blame everything, ever, on Rezo and gave up. It was the best bet, anyway.

Zelgadis stared blankly into his coffee then. It was about three in the morning, and this would mark his second night of sleepless heroics. He wondered if he mightn't be a better spellcaster on a few hours of sleep. Even just one or two. He wasn't picky.

"Zel," Xellos said, as though he'd been saying it for a few moments.

"Did you say something?" Zelgadis looked up.

There was a tiny glass bottle held between Xellos's thumb and forefinger. If what it contained was blood, it was very dark and very thick. But then, the Mazoku's form was mostly a physical projection of astral essence, so it was probably a tiny snippet of his enormous astral body given tangible form for the moment.

"Oh," said Zelgadis, and reached for it.

That was actually kind of gross. Blood, Zelgadis wasn't unused to, but this was like carrying around somebody's dismembered fingertip.

Xellos dropped it into his palm, where it made a muffled clink through his glove. For this, he was trading sexual favours with the Mazoku. Such a small thing, to be so important right now.

Xellos asked to see the spell, and Zelgadis mutely handed his scraps of paper over. He stared at his hands while the priest read it over, eyebrows rising high on his forehead. "Well, it should work, in theory," he said, and Zelgadis did not answer.

"Zelgadis-san?"

"What?" He looked up, surprised.

Xellos had dark, glittering purple eyes. They were so inhuman. Oddly familiar, and becoming increasingly moreso. "My, my, Zelgadis-san. If I'd realised this would be so traumatic for you, I'd have done it sooner."

Zelgadis did not find that all that funny, but he didn't say anything. Instead he drank the rest of his coffee from the pot and stood up. "Let's get going."

"I really should insist you sit and eat a proper breakfast," Xellos said. "Can't you smell that?"

He could, and it was delicious and it turned his stomach. He'd been magically exhausted, terrified, pissed off and sick in turns, and the scalding black coffee making its way down to his restless stomach was not helping. "I'm not hungry. There'll be plenty of time to eat after we rescue Lina and Amelia."

He started for the door.

"I'm sure there will be, knowing Lina," Xellos agreed, floating along behind him, "but the competition can certainly be fierce!"

Zelgadis snorted, but kept going. He wasn't interested in interacting with Xellos. He'd been wandering in a fog of half-realised attraction for most of a week now, but now that he was faced with the reality he mostly just felt uncomfortable. And sick.

"Ah - Just to clarify, Zel," said Xellos in a voice that was cheerful but a little bit cautious, dropping to his feet and easily keeping stride. Longer legs, Zelgadis noticed. "Your plan is to find M-san, following which you will cast a complicated spell that you first learned a few hours ago - which operates on the assumption that you actually have the magical capacity to handle the power you're channelling, obviously - and hope nobody kills you while you're presenting yourself as an enormous, stationary, spellcasting target?"

Things Zelgadis was thinking in his own mind had this alarming way of sounding ten times worse when Xellos said them.

"That sounds about right," said Zel, scrubbing at his eyes.

"Excellent! Okay," Xellos waved one arm. He floated again, moving uncertainly in the air. "That's good to know. I'll be back later. Maybe you'll even still be here!" And then with a soft hiss he was gone.

Zelgadis was totally unsurprised that Xellos had no intention of actually lifting a finger to help in the inevitable fight, but he was nonetheless a bit annoyed at being left in the drizzling streets all on his own.

It _did_ surprise him when that Cheshire grin reappeared, some few feet away, and Xellos flickered into being again shortly after. "It might be a good idea, Zelgadis-san," he said with one gloved finger pressed to the tiny furrow on his brow, "if you had something to eat."

Zelgadis just looked at him, wondering what this sudden obsession with food was meant to indicate. "What?"

"Well, then! See you!" He smiled sweetly, shimered, and was gone.

He watched the spot where the Mazoku had been for some time. His tired mind tried to puzzle out the twists and turns of Xellos's suggestion, but nothing was forthcoming.

A growl of pique and frustration escaped Zelgadis. What did that mean? He couldn't literally mean that he wanted Zelgadis to go back to the inn and order some eggs. Even if he had, the chance that Zelgadis would do as he was told was so slim that it hardly seemed worthwhile to make the suggestion.

Was Xellos trying to stall him? Did he have some other plan in mind? Or had he switched sides without telling anybody? The spell could seriously backfire if Xellos decided he didn't want it to work: the major reagent was a piece of the Mazoku, after all. But then,why would he want Zelgadis to _avoid _the confrontation? Surely the importance of Zelgadis's survival was limited to how much Xellos wanted to have sexual inter -

"Arrrgh!" He scrubbed one hand through his wiry hair, which sprang immediately back into place.

Spitting to himself, he turned on his heel and walked back to the inn.

BREAK

"You told him. That was an unexpected development," said Xellas, tugging on one of her earrings thoughtfully.

Xellos thought it was perhaps best not to say anything at all. Taking independent action was frowned upon; he might be in enough hot water as it was without making snide comments.

"Oh, stop that. You look like a kicked spaniel," she sighed deeply. Her necklaces clinked with the movement of her chest.

"Yes, Xellas-sama," he said, although this changed neither his tone nor his carefully downcast eyes. He had settled on his knees at her feet, initially, but then she'd raised her eyebrow just a fraction of an inch. Now his forehead was pressed agains the cool stone floor. Observant servants lived longer.

She was not lonely, today. Today her toes - which he had, briefly, a rather close view of - were coated in unbleached, refined flour, as though she'd missed a spot when cleaning it off. Beside her, on its own little pedestal, sat a cake. In Xellos's opinion this tasted uncannily like Gourry's socks.

"Not to encourage this sort of conceited independence," she said mildly, and he very nearly flinched, "but I do rather like Zelgadis-san, so in this case I'll overlook it and consider it merely a case of your pre-empting my own wishes. Good pet," she said, patting his head with the ball of her foot.

If Xellos had had a heart beat, it would have been fluttering wildly. As it was, he felt oddly weak as the heady sensation of relief sucked him under. "Thank you, Xellas-sama."

"Mmm," she sounded quite distracted. "I really do think this cake turned out a lot better than the cookies, don't you?"

Xellos considered that. "It does taste better," he agreed.

"Do you think she'll like it?" she wondered.

Xellos was not generally in the habit of acknowledging how very often the Knight of Cephied was in residence at the island, so he said, "I believe most people would like it, Xellas-sama."

It was even true, in as much as most people would not admit to disliking the Beastmaster's baking. Xellos just wished she'd find a new hobby soon. Even if it involved chalk powder and yards of entrails again; this time he really wasn't picky.

She lifted his chin with her toes and offered him another forkful, which he dutifully ate without the slightest hint of horror, and in return she looked upon him with a kind of distant benevolence.

"Don't do a half-hearted job of this now," she said suddenly, her bangles jangling as she shifted quickly forward in her seat. Xellos found himself the focus of her full attention, which was formidable on a good day. "If you're going to keep your own chimera you're going to have to feed him and walk him every day, and make sure that people know where to return him, should he wander away and become confused."

"Ahh... yes, Xellas-sama."

BREAK

Dog's claws clicked on the nothing-floor. He couldn't see a thing, but the smell of blood drew him closer. He hadn't so much given up on watching the girl - that would be Bad - as he had decided that she wasn't prone to doing anything except staring into space and occasionally whimpering.

It wasn't a very stimulating passtime. Mostly he checked her every couple of hours and then went back to more interesting things, like chasing his tail.

But the smell of blood was only getting stronger. His paws slipped in the sticky-sweet mess spreading across the floor. Idly, he lapped some of it up, but it tasted rank; he wrinkled his canine nose and concentrated on making some light to see by.

She had lost an awful lot of blood. All of the holes in her body were leaking slowly. He had a suspicion that 'slowly' was fast enough. Dog was not an expert, but he was fairly certain that humans needed their blood.

Amelia's pulse slowed. Her toes were swelling, just a little, her circulation damaged by her dropping blood pressure.

But Xellos had said, 'watch', not 'watch and speculate on the chance of the human's survival', so Dog sat down on his haunches, licked his nose, and settled in to watch.

BREAK

Zelgadis returned to the inn feeling ridiculous and pre-emptively humiliated. He stepped inside, door creaking, to find the innkeeper meticulously going through his belongings. They were spread across one of the large wooden tables in the common area in a display of spare clothes, steel wool and shoddy bits of magical bric-a-brac that he hadn't thought worth selling at the time.

The cracked sapphire in one particularly poor amulet (which, for some reason, seemed to attract trolls when worn, instead of good luck) gleamed coldly in the fire light.

"Er," said the innkeeper, when he looked up to find Zelgadis's deadpan stare boring through his face.

Zelgadis felt the muscle in his cheek tick violently.

"The priest said..." the innkeeper's voice trailed off in a squeak.

Of course he had. Zelgadis took a deep breath. And another one. And ano- Oh, to _hell _with it! "FIREBALL!"

Zelgadis gathered his things up. " 'Eat some food, Zelgadis-san'," he muttered in a wholly innacurate falsetto, shoving things back into bags. "My _butt_." Obviously, Xellos had just wanted to...

The object that came to hand was not one of his belongings. Zelgadis eyed it.

Xellos's voice echoed maddeningly in his head. _It might be a good idea, Zelgadis-san, if you had something to eat..._

The purple-black skin of the eggplant was glossy in the firelight, ripe and lush.

Zelgadis stepped over the twitching and blackened body of the innkeeper and sat at the table. There was a plate there, and he carefully set the eggplant down. He took up his utensils. His knife carved easily through the fruit's thick skin, splitting it open to reveal the ripe flesh and tiny, bitter seeds. He sliced off a bite-sized piece.

It tasted like eggplant. He chewed thoughtfully for a moment, and then swallowed the fruit. After a few seconds, he relaxed. Perhaps he had just been reading too far into the comment. Xellos was bizarre on a good day, after all, and not everything he said could possibly have some dark double-meaning -

Zelgadis gasped for breath over the sudden thundering of his pulse in his ears. Magic shot through his veins like liquid lightning.

_Breathe_, he reminded himself. In. Out. In again. Good.

He gripped the edge of the table and slowly exhaled. Good.

When Zelgadis left the inn once more, he was leaking magic. It drifted upwards like heavily charged smoke from his skin, crackling gently in the drizzle. Everything smelled like burnt ozone and static. His eyes glowed.

Then, riding a high of black magic and false energy, Zelgadis went to find the mysterious M-san and thoroughly explain what happened to people who kidnapped his friends.

BREAK

It's been way too long. I apologise. I'm having some problems with loading ffnet on my own computer, sadly, but I have hijacked one for the purposes of posting. Annnd have recently realised that my formatting is not working. Joy. I am very sorry. When ffnet decides to let me have formatting like a normal person, I will make proper scene breaks. 


	20. The Spell

See first chapter for disclaimer.

* * *

As Zelgadis headed back to the crumbling ruin that had been M-san's house, black magic leaked from him. Shadows twisted around his boots. Insects dropped from the air to splat against the ground. A rat staggered into the street to die, convulsing, in his wake. Then another. And another. The path he walked was marked with small furred bodies and quiet destruction.

And still the magic built. It burned until the burning drowned out all other feelings and his skin felt tight and swollen with it.

M-san was waiting for him, watching as Zelgadis approached the crater. Under the lightless sky, his face was shadowed and his eyes glinted softly.

"Somehow, I knew you wouldn't see sense," sighed the mazoku, shaking his head. He was holding the staff loosely in one hand. He looked very normal, sunk in the crater Lina's magic had made and framed by rubble and ruin.

Zelgadis bared his teeth and struggled to focus on him. The spell. He had to concentrate. There was no doubting that he would have the sheer power to back it up, but he had to concentrate.

Baby steps. First: distract the mazoku.

"Why the hell are you doing this, anyway?" he asked. His voice came out harsh. He could taste the overflow of magic as it ran over his tongue and dripped between his lips, tasting strongly (but unsurprisingly) of eggplant. He touched his mouth, but there was nothing there. Just magic.

M-san looked as though he was considering giving an explanation, frowning as he watched Zelgadis. Finally, he said: "Lina-san would have been a threat to my plans. Her involvement was inevitable. _You_ were supposed to remove her," he added with a low growl. Then, "Where has your priest friend gone?"

"Back home, I'd think." Zelgadis set the carved symbols used for the spell on the dirt, calculating the distance around himself and M-san as he did. The symbols responded to his touch, buzzing with the magic that was seeping out from his pores. This circle would not be a simple design.

There was magic in his stomach. It twisted uncomfortably. Rising nausea made him swallow a sudden rush of bile.

"And where would that be?"

Zelgadis rubbed his stomach, trying to soothe it as he judged the angles he would need. The touch of his hand just disrupted the magic that was already spinning out of control in his stomach. He yanked it away with a hiss of pain. Why did it burn so much?

"Not sure," he said, quite truthfully. His heart beat was thundering far too fast. He could hear it rattling in his skull. Blood pounded in his throat like it wanted to get free. He had to use it up before it killed him.

It took him a few seconds to regain his focus, but when he did he was ready. Feeling like his head would overflow if he tipped it too far, Zel carefully knelt to touch the ground just outside Lina's enormous crater.

With a pulse of magic, lines of light raced across the ground from his fingertips, trapping both Zel and the mazoku inside a large, glowing circle. As he slowly stood back up, the pentagram filled itself in. Arcane symbols burst into bright existence between them.

"Impressive, for a human," M-san drawled.

His gut gave a horrible lurch as power rushed out of him. The circle was made to trap a mazoku, and it should have been cast by more than one person. The drain was sudden and shocking, and Zel fought the instinct to clutch at his stomach. He swallowed down the bile that rushed into his mouth. His skin was beginning to burn, he realised after a second. Not a figurative burn - the magic was scorching his stone skin.

That was bad.

He looked at his hands, blackening and hissing in the drizzle.

The circle flickered dark as he lost concentration. A second later it was bright and shining again, but they'd both seen that momentary darkness. The mazoku was smiling.

Zelgadis licked his lips. "One spell," he promised, mentally running over the next step. "That's all it will take."

"I doubt that," said M-san. "I doubt that very much indeed. But I could be gracious," his smile twisted, just a little. "You don't have the power to pull off more than the circle alone, after all. And Lina's out of the way, isn't she?" he mused. "Even with your little amplifier, what kind of destructive spell could you hope to cast?"

"Wait and see," Zel said, a lot more confidently than he felt. He could feel the little bottle tucked away in his clothing. He'd been aware of it, peripherally, even though he couldn't feel any particular power from it. Now it was in his hand, and he flicked the cork out without looking. It certainly smelled like blood, he thought as he inhaled. Actually, everything smelled like blood.

The mazoku snorted softly. "Go on, little chimera. Do your worst - you've been so successful thus far."

His stomach rolled again, and he told it to shut the hell up because if he was feeling sick now, there was no way he was going to get through the next part of the spell before he puked. Again.

The incantation was in a language Zelgadis did not understand well, and while his haphazard translation was solid, he was sure his pronunciation was far from accurate. The words were in careful patterns, designed to trap the creature in front of him. The circle would keep it in the same area; the first part of the spell would chain it, prevent it using magic, prevent it moving. Then...

Baby steps. Trap the mazoku. He could do that.

His voice rumbled across the crater, but there was no conscious power yet, no rising wind of magic - just the steady glow of the circle and the dead air inside.

There were few things that could keep a mazoku from moving through the astral plane any which way he liked. One of those few things was clutched in Zelgadis's shaking hand, just waiting for the correct application.

The incantation ended. The magic continued to leak from his skin, thick and powerful, but it was draining quickly. He would need all of it. He had to hurry. Zelgadis took a quick, deep breath. Then another. One more gulp of air, to steel himself for what came next.

Then he tilted his head back and tipped the blood down his throat.

Later, he remembered thinking that it did not taste terribly like blood. Blood tasted like liquid rust. Whatever Xellos was made of was a taste that didn't have words attached to it. All he knew was that it hurt: it burned his mouth, stung his tongue, blistered his throat.

It boiled in his stomach. He doubled over, gasping for breath, and every inhalation seethed against his abused throat. His breath rasped, and for a second he wondered if maybe Xellos's plan hadn't been to kill him after all. Then, finally, blissfully, he felt the power begin to drain into the circle. The circle went red, then black. Twisting and writhing across the ground, it contracted.

"What-?" M-san's voice was no longer a condescending drawl as the ugly, black circle coiled around him, twirling fast enough to make Zel dizzy.

The mazoku sounded upset. Something, Zelgadis theorised, must be going right. Or at least wrong in a really productive way.

He felt it when the spell closed around M-san's form as he thrashed and jerked. It was a large form, a dull-edged astral monster - but not that large, and for a dizzy second Zelgadis wasn't sure why this had been so difficult, because this mazoku was not that strong. Not strong enough to take Lina out, surely -

With an angry roar, the creature twisted on the physical plane, jamming the staff into the ground and clinging to it. It glowed with a sudden, unholy light.

The change in power was sudden and immense. Zelgadis wavered, fighting for concentration even as the clash of their power filled the city with shrieking wind.

Zel pushed, and M-san pushed back with staggering force. So much force. Fear slithered in: what power he had wasn't going to be enough. It couldn't be. That staff had too much power in it.

His mind scrambled for a solution. There was none, so he kept trying, pushing mindlessly against the other mazoku. The staff was a magical object - it had to have a finite amount of power, somehow. But so did Zelgadis. The power he'd borrowed would not last much longer.

But perhaps, while he had all that borrowed power, he could overload it.

He drew together all of the fragments of power - the black corruption from the eggplant, the dearly-bought fragment of Xellos's power, the less corrosive essence of his own spirit - and thrust them into the spell.

Light and sound crackled from the centre of the crater. Dark jagged cracks raced across the earth. High above them, thunder roared as the winds whipped into a frenzy.

He felt it clearly when the power fighting him gave out and crumpled. He was still connected to the mazoku by magic when the creature was crushed, annihilated by the spell.

There was one sharp burst of lightning. It illuminated the thin, cracked staff laying scorched in the centre of the crater. Thunder followed a few seconds after.

Then, silence. Heavy humidity, the soft fall of rain. There wasn't even the burn of magic, Zelgadis realised after a moment. He had no more magic. He was totally drained.

His ears rang.

_Can I sleep yet? _Zelgadis wondered. His vision blurred. But, no; he would need to collect the staff. Collect the staff, save Amelia, save Lina, then sleep. Did they even know where Lina was?

He took a step forward. It was wholly unsurprising that his knees gave out.

What was surprising was when he didn't hit the ground. It took him almost five seconds to notice.

"Oh dear," said a familiar, grating voice above his head somewhere as his vision flickered. "This won't do."

Zelgadis found himself tossed carelessly over a Xellos's shoulder, watching the ground move under his feet for a few seconds. Then he blacked out.

* * *

Meetings of the citizens' affairs council were among the most boring, long and taxing that Prince Philionel had to attend. While he understood that the concerns of his citizens, and thus their elected representatives, were just as important as foreign policy and other state issues, he couldn't help but feel that the time could be better spent. Possibly by watching paint dry.

"I move a procedural motion that we close the speaking list during the next speaker," said one of the councilmen, raising his hand.

"Oh, thank god," muttered the secretary as the Crown Prince yawned as discreetly as possible. It wasn't very discreet. By this point in time, he would settle for just about any kind of distraction. Phil wasn't fussy.

"I'd like it noted that I -" a particularly pompous minister interjected, but she was cut off.

"The motion is that we close the list during the next speaker. All in favour?" A pause. Fabric rustled. "All opposed?" A lone hand went up.

Philionel jerked back into full wakefulness when the bloodied body of his youngest daughter fell onto the table with a hard, wet thump. A cloaked, floating figure beamed around at the councilmen. His face was shadowed, but his white teeth were still bright in his face. "Sorry to interrupt," he said with a friendly wave. "But it seems that Amelia-san is in need of a healer."

There was a shocked pause, and then a sudden uproar. Servants sprinted for the nearest temple, yelling ahead for a healer to be sent. The table was cleared. Voices rose in dismay.

"Well," said the figure, hovering a bit higher, "I'm sure she'll be fine. Why don't you keep an eye on her, though, anyway?" And he disappeared, just as the first of the healers came dashing.

"Keep her breathing!" yelled somebody as the figure faded from the air with a broad, unfriendly smile.

"Were you going to eat that?" growled a low male voice from somewhere around Phil's elbow. Nobody answered Dog, so he helped himself to the rest of the councilman's lunch and dutifully watched the proceedings.

* * *

The thing about unconsciousness was that it allowed other interested parties to deal with the aftermath. It was the one benefit of spending long periods floating deep below consciousness.

Zelgadis lost some time in aching darkness, but when he blinked himself conscious he decided that not much time had passed. Not enough, anyway. Everything ached, and he could hear Xellos humming. That never boded well.

Another body had joined him, tossed over Xellos's shoulder, slight and warm; female. A trail of bright red hair obscured his vision for a second, and then he was dumped on the ground and everything span the right way up again. Zelgadis's stomach lurched.

Gourry hit the ground next to him, snoring heavily. Zel scowled at him.

Lina's body was dropped on top of his legs. Xellos didn't even seem to do anything with the Dolphin's Staff when he touched her. It was just a tap with one end, and then her voice broke on an unhappy groan.

He stared blankly at Lina as the intelligence and personality returned to her eyes. He knew it was a good thing that she was with them, but he couldn't muster the emotional capacity to think about it. "Amelia?" he said.

"Amelia needed a healer," Xellos said, tilting his head sideways. "It's not a common talent among mazoku. Philionel-san seemed very surprised," he added, scratching his forehead, "but I'm sure he was happy to see his daughter."

Zelgadis wondered how happy he had really been. But if Amelia was in Seyrunn, and she'd been alive when she arrived, then she would probably be okay. She had access to some of the best healers in the world. "Promise," he demanded.

Xellos's eyebrows rose. "Don't you trust me, Zelgadis?" he said, sounding wounded.

"_Promise_," he repeated.

One purple eye flicked open. They were nice eyes, really. Zelgadis stared at it without further thought.

"Okay," Xellos said, face blank. "I promise."

Zelgadis nodded and stopped struggling to sit up. His body slumped sideways, his spiky hair cushioned on Gourry's shin. He was asleep in seconds.

* * *

I was looking around at some very old things last night and realised that I hadn't updated this in, you know, six months. I swear I didn't mean to leave it so long! Anyway, home stretch now - only one or two chapters to go. The next one is looking like it will be many times more gratifying than this one. I WILL write them. You have every right (and all encouragement) to send me irritating messages to update so I don't forget.

As always, to the people who are still reading this so-rarely-updated fanfic and care enough to review it, thank you thank you thank you. You do my ego good.


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